The Regulatory Fiasco That Was Sahara

This is a gripping story that demands of the reader that she reads it at one go. Speaking for myself, I would have succumbed to the demand even without the prompting by the headlines emerging from the country’s apex court and prison complex, so to speak.

Can money grow on trees? Apparently yes, if one were to go by Tamal Bandyopadhyay’s Sahara story. Narrated with journalistic panache, the book offers the reader a peep into the mysteries surrounding Sahara’s phenomenal growth. With an initial capital of Rs 2,000, Sahara, within a span of just two and a half decades since 1978, came to become the size of a conglomerate with 4,000-odd companies, over 30 million depositors and investors, with businesses spread across finance, real estate, media, hospitality, airlines, cricket, Formula One, and what not.