Ashok P Hinduja and Family

The Hinduja Group operates across commercial vehicles, banking and lubricants in nearly 40 countries. Ashok Leyland is where most Indians encounter it.

The Hinduja Group is one of the more genuinely global Indian business families, with a presence spanning commercial vehicles, banking, lubricants and media across nearly 40 countries. Ashok Leyland, the group's most significant Indian operating business, is the country's second-largest manufacturer of commercial vehicles, producing trucks and buses that form a core part of India's road freight and public transport infrastructure. The company exports to markets across Asia, Africa and the Middle East, and its product range has expanded to include electric buses as the transition to lower-emission commercial transport accelerates.

The group's other significant Indian holding is IndusInd Bank, in which the Hindujas are the founding promoter family, alongside Gulf Oil in the lubricants market. The family is headquartered across London, Geneva and other international centres, having built its initial wealth through trade and commodities businesses outside India before investing substantially back into the subcontinent. Managing a portfolio of this geographic spread and sectoral diversity across multiple generations requires governance structures that most purely domestic Indian conglomerates have not needed to develop.