Who is Sajan Jindal, the billionaire Indian businessman facing trial on rape charges?
An FIR has been registered against India’s leading businessman and industrialist Sajjan Jindal after a Bollywood actress accused him of rape. Billionaire businessman Sajjan Jindal has termed the allegations leveled by the 30-year-old actress as ‘false’ and ‘baseless’.
According to the FIR, the woman claims that she met Sajjan in Dubai a few years ago and both shared their numbers during a match.
The woman has alleged that on January 23, Sajjan raped her at the headquarters of his company JSW. The woman alleges that Jindal had promised her marriage.
After the order of the court, the Mumbai police has registered a case of rape against Sajjan Jindal on the complaint of a woman.
What are the allegations in the FIR?
The FIR was registered on December 13 under sections 376 (rape), 354 and 506 of the Indian Penal Code on the orders of the Bombay High Court.
Mr. Jindal’s company rejected the allegations, saying, “This allegation is completely false and baseless.” Sajjan Jindal is committed to fully cooperate with the investigation.
“As the investigation is ongoing, no further comment should be made on this matter at this time,” the company added. We appeal to you to respect the family’s privacy.”
According to the FIR, the complainant is an actress and she met Sajjan Jindal in October 2021 in Dubai where they both watched an Indian Premier League match in the VIP box.
According to the FIR, the woman has claimed that ‘my brother is a real estate consultant in Dubai and Jindal showed interest in buying the property after which we gave each other our phone numbers.’
The woman claims that they then met again in December 2021 in Mumbai and in Jaipur the same month at the wedding of former MP Praful Patel’s son.
In her petition, the woman alleged that during the meeting in Jaipur, his attitude became friendly and we started talking. They started calling me babe or baby and insisted on meeting me in the hotel room.
In her complaint, the woman has said that during the conversation, Jindal mentioned the problems of her married life, but she became uncomfortable with such conversations.
According to the FIR, the woman alleged that in January she went to the company’s headquarters for a meeting where Jindal took her to the penthouse and forced her despite her protests.
According to the woman, even after this incident, she continued her friendship with Jindal, but Jindal stopped talking to her and blocked her number.
He further alleged that he was also threatened with dire consequences if he lodged a complaint with the police.
The story of the rise of the Sajjan Jindal family
After this news came out, Sajjan Jindal is the topic of discussion on social media. And the impact of this news is also visible on the stock market.
The story of the growth of the Jindal family business begins in the 1930s. Om Prakash Jindal was born in a farming family in the village of Nalwa in Hisar, Haryana.
Growing up, one day Om Prakash saw ‘Made in England’ written on a steel pipe. According to a report in the Economic Times, Om Prakash wondered why such pipes were not made in India and why they were not labeled ‘Made in India’.
This is where the story of Om Prakash Jindal’s growth begins. The story began in 1952 with the Bucket Manufacturing Company which grew into a pipe manufacturing company named Jindal India Limited in 1964.
According to the company’s website, a large factory called Jindal Strips Limited was started in 1969.
OP Jindal came into politics holding the hand of Congress. He was a three-time MLA and also reached the Lok Sabha in 1996.
When OP Jindal died in a helicopter crash in 2005, all eyes turned to his two sons Sajjan, Naveen and wife Savitri Jindal.
Last week (on December 12, 2023), Forbes named Savitri Jindal among the 10 richest women in India. In the same Forbes report, Savitri Jindal’s net worth is estimated at 29 billion dollars.
According to Forbes, Savitri Jindal’s family is the fourth richest family in India after Mukesh Ambani, Gautam Adani and Shiv Nadir.
Savitri Jindal has also entered politics. He won the 2005 assembly election from Hisar in Haryana. She was re-elected in 2009 and became a minister in the Haryana government in 2013.
Savitri’s two sons also head various units of the Jindal company. Naveen Jindal is the younger son and Sajjan Jindal is the elder.
Apart from business, another recognition of 53-year-old Naveen Jindal is that on his own initiative, the Indian court demanded a change in the flag code. Because of this, every Indian was allowed to hoist the national flag.
Sajjan Jindal studied Mechanical Engineering. He is currently 64 years old.
Sajjan Jindal was married to Sangeeta Jindal and they have two daughters Tarini, Tanvi and a son Parth.
According to the company’s website, Sajjan Jindal started his career in 1982 at a steel plant.
After the death of his father OP Jindal in a helicopter crash in 2005, Sajjan Jindal took over his father’s legacy, OP Jindal’s subsidiary steel company JSW.
According to the World Steel website, JSW is the second largest steel company in India and the 15th largest in the world.
Apart from steel, Sajjan Jindal’s company is also working in the energy sector. The company is the fourth largest company in the energy sector after Tata, Adani and Reliance.
Sajjan Jindal is a big name in the world of steel and has been honored with many awards.
Sajjan Jindal’s son Parth is the chairman of JSW Cement Company. JSW has also ventured into the paint business a few years ago.
According to the company’s website, this $23 billion company is also in the business of mining, energy, sports, cement, paint, infrastructure, software.
‘Back Channel Diplomacy’ with Sajjan Jindal and Pakistan
Sajjan Jindal is known as a relatively ‘low profile’ personality. They rarely feature in the country’s politics or media, and little is known about them.
However, when he visited Pakistan in 2017 and met Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, he received a lot of attention.
Even Maryam Nawaz Sharif, the daughter of the Prime Minister, in response to the rumors in the media, said in her message on Twitter that Sajjan Jindal is an old friend of the Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and did not misrepresent the meeting of the two friends.
However, on December 25, 2015, when Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi suddenly arrived in Lahore without any program after returning from Afghanistan to meet Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, it was said that Jindal had arranged this meeting between the two Prime Ministers. was
According to a 2017 BBC report, it is not clear how Sajjan Jindal came so close to Narendra Modi, but one of the reasons may be his closeness to Nawaz Sharif.
In 2017, India’s leading journalist and analyst Barkha Dutt wrote about him that Jindal is an “informal envoy” of Modi who acts as a “secret bridge” between the two leaders and is “extremely difficult”. Even under the circumstances, he is the link of communication between the two leaders.
New business initiatives
In 2017, the JSW Group company planned to invest $623 million to build infrastructure related to electric cars, batteries and charging, according to a report by the Economic Times.
In the same year, Sajjan Jindal said in an interview that initially his company would start the electric vehicle business after buying batteries from a supplier.
At a business summit held in August 2023, Sajjan Jindal had said that his company should enter the electric vehicle business as it is the future and now is the right time to enter the sector.
Last month JSW Group’s JSW Infra, the country’s second-largest commercial port company, won a Rs 4,119-crore project to develop Kani Port in Karnataka, beating Gautam Adani’s company.