Ambani wedding puts new spin on Indian business

Wed in India. The wedding celebrations of India's rich are worth watching closely. Anant Ambani, a director of $243 billion Reliance Industries and son of Chair Mukesh Ambani, held his three-day pre-nuptials bash in Jamnagar, a small town in India's Gujarat state with strict alcohol prohibition laws, over the weekend. He'll marry in July. It answers Prime Minister Narendra Modi's call to shun overseas destination weddings - but the prize for India is much bigger than keeping the $50 billion domestic industry onshore.

Indian weddings can be expensive spectacles and society events. The Ambani celebrations are no exception. Guests including Reliance's top investors and business partners, such as bosses of global companies like Meta's Mark Zuckerberg, Brookfield Asset Management's Bruce Flatt and Murray Auchincloss of BP, were treated to a performance by pop superstar Rihanna and 500 dishes created by 100 chefs in a jungle-themed jamboree, per Reuters. Reliance's telecom unit Jio Platforms counts Meta-owned Facebook as a big shareholder; the sprawling conglomerate has also teamed up with Brookfield Infrastructure to build data centres and BP for petrol stations across the country.

The executives are inadvertently showcasing Modi's desire to keep wealth at home. "If we celebrate the festivities of marriages on Indian soil, amid the people of India, the country's money will remain in the country," the prime minister told listeners of his monthly radio programme in November. Ambani's daughter, also a member of the company's board, had her engagement party in Italy in 2018.

It's the latest sign of India's rising economic nationalism. In January, Modi travelled to Lakshadweep to promote the tropical islands off the coast of Kerala as an alternative to the Maldives, which is popular among Indians, who already face restrictions on taking money overseas. Encouraging them to spend more at home can help to avert economic headaches. The government frequently tries to curb their desire to buy imported gold as part of its effort to keep the country's current account deficit in check.

In his plea over weddings and tourism, Modi also may have one eye on supporting the Reserve Bank of India's efforts to protect the rupee and, by extension, India's attractiveness as an investment destination. The currency has depreciated at an annual rate of 2.9% against the dollar over the last 10 years and that raises the rate of return global investors seek on their investments.

That is the real prize. India's economy is growing fast but foreign direct investment that can help to create jobs isn't keeping up. The central bank uses some of its $619 billion of foreign exchange reserves to keep the currency in a tight range, though India insists it isn't intervening excessively.

For now, Modi's pleas underscore a tailwind: India's large and growing pool of captive capital. This helps to prop up the stock market at persistently high valuations. The MSCI India Index trades at 22 times forward earnings, twice as expensive as other emerging markets. That gives guests at the Ambani wedding something extra to cheer.