The Breaking of a Pact

At the heart of the Hinduja family feud is a letter signed by the brothers to stay undivided. But there’s a lot more than meets the eye

- Manu Balachandran

It’s quite unlikely that the Hindujas have not heard of the old American proverb, ‘Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations’.

If not the exact words, they would certainly have come across some variant of it, found across cultures, describing the inability of the third generation to manage the wealth passed down to them by their grandparents and parents. Certainly, as with many family businesses before them that have thrived before splitting, the Hindujas, modern-day torchbearers of India’s family business legacy, thought it wouldn’t befall them.

For over five decades, Srichand Hinduja, and his three younger brothers, Gopichand, Prakash and Ashok, had built up an empire— almost equivalent to the GDP of Mongolia—cutting their teeth across continents, hobnobbing with politicians, film stars, and royalty. All through that time, the brothers painted a unified front, often comparing themselves to the righteous brothers of the Ramayana, with different bodies and one soul. They share a mansion with four inter-connected houses spread over 67,000 sq ft in London’s upmarket neighborhood of Westminster and are neighbors to the British Queen.

Today, however, the fab four, as they have been known for long, is a divided house and three of the brothers are busy firefighting to douse a dispute involving the heirs of the patriarch. As Srichand fights dementia, something insiders say has been ongoing for three to four years, his daughters, Vinoo and Shanu, have stepped forward to challenge an accord reportedly signed by the brothers on the ways to split the family empire.