Gautam Adani

The ports tycoon's closeness to Prime Minister Narendra Modi sent shares of all his companies, including flagship Adani Enterprises, soaring ahead of the general elections in May riding on hopes of a BJP victory. The biggest dollar gainer on the list, Adani added more than $4 billion to his net worth since 2013. In a buying spree, he bought the Dhamra Port in eastern India from the Tata Group for $900 million in May; in August, he inked a $1 billion deal to acquire a power plant in southern India from the Lanco Group, owned by erstwhile rich-lister L Madhusudan Rao. The Australian government gave its long-pending approval to his controversial coal mining project in Queensland, despite protests by Greenpeace that it would damage the environment.