Biography

Four Hinduja brothers - NRI Srichand and Gopichand are now UK citizens, NRI Prakash in Geneva is a Swiss national and Ashok in Bombay is an Indian citizen.

The Hinduja brothers control an business empire founded by their Indian father who left the province of Sind for Iran 80 years ago. They are intensely secretive about the size of their wealth but one some newspaper estimated it to be in the region of $8bn.

They are involve in global finance, telecommunications, film and oil businesses. Srichand and Gopichand are now estimated by the British press to be the 13th most wealthy people in Britain.

NRI Srichand and Gopichand moved to London in 1979 and developed their father's import and export business.The notoriously private Hinduja brothers manage the London-based Hinduja Group, a company founded by their father 86 years ago.

Parmanand Deepchand Hinduja started out as a moneylender before expanding the business to include imports of dried fruit, jute, textiles and tea. The business grew steadily under the late shah of Iran and continued to flourish even after he was overthrown. It is now a multibillion-dollar energy, transport, media and agriculture conglomerate. The company had been in a bidding war to acquire the Express Newspapers group, and is one of several bidders for Go, British Airways' low-cost airline.

Political ties

The family is more open about its political ties and has had close relationships with a host of world leaders, ranging from the late shah of Iran, to George Bush Sr and Tony Blair. The Hinduja brothers boast a network of rich and influential friends that includes senior British politicians former US President Bill Clinton and Queen Elizabeth the Second.

These two brothers are well known not just for their support over the years to the Conservative and Labour parties, but also because of large charitable donations made through their Hinduja Foundation.

They have given money for the construction and decoration of at least two Hindu temples in the south-east of England.

More controversially they contributed £1m ($1.5m) to the construction of the ill-fated Millennium Dome on the River Thames, an issue that resulted in the resignation of UK minister Peter Mandelson.

Mr Mandelson, who was in charge of the Dome project, was accused of pulling strings to help Srichand Hinduja secure UK citizenship.

Mr Mandelson stepped down after admitting making misleading statements about Mr Hinduja's passport application. Subsequent inquiries cleared Mr Mandelson of any wrongdoing

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