Believe it or not they started from literally nothing and it is a fascinating story, taking advantage of all the new corrupt officials who were hungry for money.
The father of the brothers, Shiv Kumar Gupta lived in a city called Saharanpur situated in northern India and was a spice trader.The brothers were born in the late 60's and early 70's. He sent them to different cities in the world to find their fortunes. Ajay went to Delhi, Rajesh to China, and Atul to Africa. His thinking on this was that these places were all changing and there would be opportunities. Atul arrived in Johannesburg in late 1993 as transformation was happening.
International sanctions were lifting and Mandela was the new President. Foreign investment was flooding in and the regular black guy in the street was becoming a consumer. Atul saw an opportunity as the country was behind on technology and needed a computer on every desk. In 1994 he founded Sahara Computers an importer and distributor of Windows PC's. He was able to under cut the prices of cartels that had a monopoly on the growing business. His brothers shut down what they were doing elsewhere and joined him. Their decision was that the government was ripe to exploit and now was for making inroads.
The growth happened when they met a senior Government official Essop Pahad. Atul was invited as a special guest as part of the Deputy President's team on a business trip to India in 1996. The doors were starting to open as he met many important decision makers. Mbeki succeeded Mandela as Pesident in 1999 and the access they wished for happened. Sahara computers were ordered for schools and government departments. With the new found wealth they invested in mining and started a coal company that supplied to the State power stations. They were now getting filthy rich.
The political landscape was changing so the brothers hedged their bets. Atul was an Mbeki's side while Rajesh courted Zuma. In 2005 Zuma's family started on the Gupta's payroll. Duduzane, Zuma's son was hired and placed in IT, his sister was appointed as a director and one of Zuma's four wives became a communications officer.
Duduzane, became more involved and was made a director as they started purchasing mines (Uranium and Coal).In 2007 Mbeki was deposed and Zuma took over as party chief, he was appointed President in 2009. On his first state visit the Gupta brothers accompanied him everywhere. Businessman didn't know what to make of them as they hadn't heard of them before.
Their influence and power spread slowly starting off with a newspaper and TV station tapping into the $50 million state budget. Zuma made a phone call to the government official in charge and said "these guys need your help". Later the Gupta's explained what help meant and it was expected that they would take the whole budget. Masko was the government official and he refused to do what was being asked of him. He was fired by Zuma and replaced within 2 months . Three more officials from the (FBI) Hawks were fired as they were asking questions.
The Guptas became a household name in 2013 when a jet carrying 200 guests going to a Gupta wedding, didn't land at the International airport ,but the local Air Force base. Passports were handed in on mass and no screening happened. Hired SUV's ferried the passengers in a huge police convoy with flashing lights to Sun City for the event. The relatives and friends must have thought they were royalty and the brothers were powerful with huge influence. The public woke up as this has never happened before. Police taken away from their duties for a wedding.An Air Force base used for civillians with no security checks. Who was footing the bill for the police etc?
The official who arranged the landing of the plane was a man called Zwane. An Agriculture minister, from the Free State province who helped the Gupta's land a $10 million a year government subsidy for a dairy farm. Very little money went to the farm and was funneled to accounts in the Middle east.
It has later been revealed that the Gupta's gained access to other State departments. Power utilities, weapons and transport were not missed either. Transnet, the Government rail network was shopping for locomotives. They were getting bids from General Electric and Bombardier who were clear front runners. The deal was eventually signed for 40 percent more than the original fee of $4.7 billion and handed to 2 Chinese companies. The Gupta's were involved and would later show the head of Transnet Brian Molefe was to now move to Eskom, the National Power Utility. It is one of South Africa's largest companies turning over more than $10 Billion a year.
Will do the second part on the next post as there is still far more to come and how they screwed Glencore out of a mine. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed researching this .
Images courtesy of Hindustan times and pininterest.com