Savitri Jindal: From Homemaker to India’s Richest Woman

Early Life & Family Origins

Savitri Devi Jindal was born on March 20, 1950, in Tinsukia, a town in Assam, India, into a Hindu Marwari family with roots tracing back to Rajasthan. Details about her childhood and early education remain limited in public record — a reflection of how private the family kept its personal life even as it built one of India’s largest industrial conglomerates. Some profiles describe her formal education as a diploma-level qualification, though precise details of where she studied are not consistently documented.

Marriage into the Jindal Family 1970

Savitri married Om Prakash Jindal — known widely as O.P. Jindal — around 1970. According to Bloomberg’s reporting, the marriage was arranged by her father under unusual circumstances: O.P. Jindal’s first wife, Vidya Devi, was Savitri’s own sister, and after Vidya Devi’s death, Savitri’s father arranged for her to marry her widowed brother-in-law. O.P., roughly two decades older than Savitri, already had six children from his first marriage — the eldest of whom was close to Savitri in age. Savitri and O.P. went on to have nine children of their own: four sons — Prithviraj, Sajjan, Ratan, and Naveen — and five daughters, whose lives have largely been kept out of the public eye.

O.P. Jindal: Building the Empire 1952 Onward

O.P. Jindal was a self-made industrialist and engineer who began his business career manufacturing buckets in 1952, before founding a pipe-manufacturing unit, Jindal India, in 1964. Over the following decades, he built this modest start into the O.P. Jindal Group, a diversified conglomerate with interests spanning steel, power generation, cement, mining, and infrastructure. He also had a parallel political career, serving as Power Minister in the Indian state of Haryana and representing the Hisar constituency in the Haryana Legislative Assembly for many years. Savitri, though not formally involved in day-to-day business operations during this period, was known to have a genuine grasp of the business and was consulted informally by her husband.

Tragedy & Taking the Helm 2005

O.P. Jindal died in a helicopter crash in March 2005, thrusting Savitri — until then largely known as a homemaker — into leadership of a major industrial empire and into a political career of her own almost overnight. She had not previously worked as a frontline business executive, but rose to the challenge, taking over as chairperson of the O.P. Jindal Group. She also inherited her husband’s political base, winning his former Hisar constituency seat in the Haryana Vidhan Sabha election held later that year.

Leading the O.P. Jindal Group 2005–Present

Under Savitri Jindal’s stewardship, the O.P. Jindal Group’s revenue quadrupled, and Jindal Steel grew to become the third-largest steel producer in India. Rather than manage every division personally, she divided the conglomerate’s operating companies among her four sons even before O.P.’s death, and formalized that structure afterward — with each son given roughly a fifth of the family’s shareholding in every company, while O.P. himself (and later Savitri) retained the remaining fifth as a unifying stake. She has continued to provide strategic oversight and guidance to her sons rather than run daily operations herself, a role now formally reflected in her title of chairperson emeritus.

The Empire Today: Four Sons, Four Verticals Business Structure

Under her sons’ leadership, the group has continued expanding well beyond India’s borders, acquiring iron ore mines in Chile and coal mines in Mozambique, and listing power producer JSW Energy on the National Stock Exchange of India. More recently, Sajjan Jindal launched an electric-vehicle joint venture with MG Motor in 2024 that has already sold over 100,000 EVs, and took JSW Cement public in an August 2025 listing. The group is also investing in renewable energy and green steel technology as part of a broader sustainability push.

Political Career 2005–Present

Savitri Jindal was first elected to the Haryana Vidhan Sabha from the Hisar constituency in 2005, the same seat her late husband had long represented, and was re-elected in 2009. She served as a Minister of State for Revenue and Disaster Management, Consolidation, Rehabilitation and Housing, and later for Urban Local Bodies and Housing, before being appointed a full Cabinet Minister in the Haryana government on October 29, 2013, holding the power portfolio until the government’s term ended in 2014, when she lost her seat.

The 2024 Party Switch Political Realignment

After nearly two decades associated with the Indian National Congress, Savitri Jindal resigned her Congress party membership on March 27, 2024, and moved toward the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ahead of that year’s general election. Her son Naveen Jindal joined the BJP around the same time and went on to win a parliamentary seat from Kurukshetra — a constituency he has said his father built a personal connection to three decades earlier, one he intended to carry forward.

In the subsequent Haryana state assembly elections in October 2024, Savitri contested the Hisar seat as an independent candidate rather than under a party banner, and won by a margin of more than 18,000 votes over her nearest rival, Ram Niwas Rara. On October 9, 2024, following meetings with Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and former Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Deb, she announced her support for the BJP-led Haryana state government, aligning her independent legislative seat with the ruling party.

Controversy 2014

In 2014, Savitri Jindal filed a complaint against media executive Subhash Chandra and Zee News CEO Samir Ahluwalia over what she described as false reporting that damaged her public reputation — one of the relatively few public controversies associated with a family that has otherwise maintained a notably low media profile given its wealth and influence.

Family Details Family Tree

Husband: Om Prakash Jindal (1930–2005), founder of the O.P. Jindal Group and former Haryana Power Minister, who died in a helicopter crash in March 2005. Savitri has remained a widow since his death and has not remarried.

Sons: Prithviraj Jindal, Sajjan Jindal (JSW Group), Ratan Jindal (Jindal Stainless), and Naveen Jindal (Jindal Steel & Power and BJP Member of Parliament from Kurukshetra).

Daughters: Five daughters, whose names and professional lives have been kept largely outside public and media coverage, consistent with the family’s generally private approach to its personal affairs.

The extended Jindal family reportedly lives in a compound of four connected bungalows in New Delhi sharing a common kitchen — a living arrangement often cited as reflecting the family’s continued emphasis on unity even as its individual businesses have grown into separate, publicly traded giants. Savitri Jindal’s own registered residence is listed as Jindal House, O.P. Jindal Marg, Model Town, Hisar. She practices Hinduism, and personal profiles list her hobbies as reading and cooking. Details of her own parents’ names have not been widely publicized.

Philanthropy Giving Back

Beyond her business and political roles, Savitri Jindal serves as president of Maharaja Agrasen Medical College in Agroha, Haryana, reflecting a family commitment to expanding access to medical education in the region. She has continued to support the broader social-welfare agenda her husband began, with a particular focus on education, healthcare, and environmental initiatives.

Net Worth Wealth

Estimates of Savitri Jindal’s net worth vary considerably depending on the source, the date, and whether the figure represents her personal holdings or the combined wealth of the wider Jindal family. Her wealth has grown substantially over time: Forbes listed her at $8.8 billion in 2018 as India’s richest woman; by December 20, 2023, her net worth was estimated at $25.3 billion, making her India’s fifth-wealthiest person overall; and by March 2024, that figure had risen further to roughly $31.5 billion, moving her up to India’s fourth-richest person. Forbes placed her individual net worth at $34.4 billion in October 2024, while Wikipedia cites the broader Jindal family’s net worth at approximately $40 billion as of October 2025. Other trackers have published figures ranging from roughly $27 billion to $43.7 billion across 2024–2026, with her wealth having grown from an estimated $8 billion in 2010 at a compound annual growth rate of roughly 10%. She surpassed China’s Yang Huiyan to become Asia’s richest woman on July 29, 2022, and has consistently ranked as India’s richest woman and among the world’s 50–60 wealthiest individuals in subsequent years. Her fortune is drawn primarily from her family’s holdings in JSW Steel, Jindal Steel & Power, Jindal Stainless, JSW Energy, and other group companies.

Declared Assets & Properties Election Disclosure

As a sitting Haryana legislator, Savitri Jindal has been required to publicly declare her personal assets as part of her election filings — figures that are far more modest than her market-linked net worth, since most of her actual wealth is held indirectly through family shareholding structures rather than as personal cash or property.

Movable Assets

Immovable Assets

Honors & Recognition Recognition

Quick Facts At a Glance

Milestone Timeline Journey

Frequently Asked Questions FAQ

Who is Savitri Jindal?
Savitri Jindal is an Indian businesswoman and politician who serves as chairperson emeritus of the O.P. Jindal Group, a major steel, power, and infrastructure conglomerate, and is widely recognized as India’s richest woman.

How did Savitri Jindal take over the Jindal Group?
She took charge after her husband, O.P. Jindal, died in a helicopter crash in March 2005, having previously been a homemaker with no formal executive experience.

How many children does Savitri Jindal have?
Nine — four sons (Prithviraj, Sajjan, Ratan, and Naveen) who each lead different parts of the family business, and five daughters who have largely stayed out of the public eye.

Is Savitri Jindal divorced?
No. She was widowed when her husband died in 2005 and has not remarried; some online sources incorrectly describe her as divorced.

What is Savitri Jindal’s net worth?
Estimates vary by source and date; Forbes placed her individual net worth at $34.4 billion in October 2024, while the broader Jindal family’s net worth was estimated near $40 billion as of late 2025.

What is Savitri Jindal’s political affiliation?
She was associated with the Indian National Congress from 2005 until March 2024, when she resigned and moved toward the BJP, later winning her Haryana assembly seat as an independent and backing the BJP-led state government.