Baba Kalyani (Babasaheb Neelkanth Kalyani) is the Chairman and Managing Director of Bharat Forge and head of the Pune-based Kalyani Group. He turned his father's small forging company into a global supplier of truck, aerospace and defence parts, including artillery guns.

What is Baba Kalyani's net worth in 2026?

Forbes ranked Baba Kalyani No. 58 on its India's 100 Richest 2026 list with US$5.0 billion, and put him at US$4.8 billion on its real-time list on 19 October 2026. Most of the wealth is the family's roughly 43% promoter stake in Bharat Forge, held through investment companies.

Where is Baba Kalyani from?

He was born in Pune on 7 January 1949. His family roots are in Karad in Satara district, Maharashtra, where his father's family were farmers and traders.

What is Baba Kalyani's education?

He studied at the Rashtriya Military School in Belgaum, earned a BE (Hons) in mechanical engineering from BITS Pilani, and a Master of Science from MIT in the US.

How did Baba Kalyani build Bharat Forge?

He joined in 1972 and in 1989 spent about Rs 100 crore, close to the company's annual turnover, on modern press lines. That won US truck-parts orders from 1993, followed by acquisitions in Germany, Sweden and the US in 2004-05, and later a big move into artillery and aerospace.

What is the Kalyani family dispute about?

Since 2023 his sister Sugandha Hiremath's family has sued him over Hikal shares and claimed partition of what they call a Kalyani family estate worth about Rs 1 lakh crore, while his brother Gaurishankar contests their mother's 2012 will. Baba Kalyani denies the claims, and the cases are pending; the Supreme Court sent the dispute to mediation in July 2026.

Who will succeed Baba Kalyani?

His son Amit Kalyani has been Vice-Chairman and Joint Managing Director of Bharat Forge since May 2024, with a term to May 2029. No formal succession plan has been published; Baba Kalyani's own term runs to March 2028.

Baba Kalyani: Bharat Forge Chairman Biography

Key facts
Born	7 January 1949, Pune, Maharashtra [5][22]
Family roots	Karad, Satara district; father Neelkanth Kalyani, a sugarcane farmer turned industrialist, founded Bharat Forge [34][28]
Education	Rashtriya Military School, Belgaum; BE (Hons) Mechanical Engineering, BITS Pilani; MS, Massachusetts Institute of Technology [22][2]
Family	Son Amit Kalyani is Vice-Chairman and Joint MD of Bharat Forge; siblings Gaurishankar Kalyani and Sugandha Hiremath [1][34]
Company	Chairman and Managing Director, Bharat Forge Ltd, Pune; head of the Kalyani Group [1]
Wealth	US$5.0 billion, No. 58 on Forbes’s India’s 100 Richest 2026 list (Sep 2026); US$4.8 billion on Forbes’s real-time list, 19 Oct 2026 [61][62]
Known for	Turning a small Pune forging shop into one of the world’s biggest forging companies, then into India’s leading private maker of artillery guns

Sometime in 1995, a 46-year-old Indian engineer walked into the office of a senior executive at a European car company. He introduced himself and said his company made auto components. He would like to supply engine parts.

“The person just stopped short of grabbing me by the collar and throwing me out of his office for making such a ridiculous suggestion,” Baba Kalyani recalled years later. “‘This is high-tech manufacturing and there’s no way I’m letting an Indian company do it,’ he said. Somewhere that lit a fire in me” [30].

About twelve years later, according to The Economic Times, Bharat Forge had 100% of that customer’s business [30].

The story says a lot about the man. He does not take “no” well. He prefers machines to speeches. And he spent five decades proving that an Indian factory could beat Germany, Sweden and America at their own game.

When he joined his father’s company in 1972, it was a small Pune forge that had been losing money [32]. In 2025-26, Bharat Forge’s consolidated revenue was Rs 16,812 crore [1]. It supplies crankshafts and axle beams to truck makers in America and Europe, titanium parts to Boeing, fan blades to Rolls-Royce, and artillery guns to the Indian Army [52][53][48]. Forbes valued Baba Kalyani’s fortune at US$5.0 billion in September 2026 [62].

The record also has a harder side. Since 2023 he has been fighting his own sister and other relatives in court over a family fortune that they put at about Rs 1 lakh crore [74]. Some of his bets cost hundreds of crores. Many institutional investors voted against his last re-appointment [6]. This is the full story, as far as the public record shows it.

Where it began

A farmer who chose factories

The Kalyanis come from Karad in Satara district, a sugar-belt town in western Maharashtra. Baba Kalyani’s father, Neelkanth Kalyani, was born in Kolhapur on 20 August 1926 into a family of farmers and traders from Karad [34]. Forbes says he owned about 60 acres of sugarcane land, which made his farm a fairly big one by Indian standards [28].

Neelkanth was more than a farmer. He chaired the Maharashtra State Co-operative Land Development Bank for 12 years [34][33]. In the 1960s he decided to move into manufacturing [28].

Bharat Forge was incorporated in Bombay on 19 June 1961, in collaboration with Steel Improvement and Forge Co. (SIFCO) of the United States [4][35]. Commercial production began in 1966 at a new plant in Mundhwa, on the edge of Pune [35]. Industrialist S.L. Kirloskar encouraged Neelkanth to set up a unit making forgings and crankshafts for the diesel engines Kirloskar built in Pune [32]. Most of the early customers made engines for tractors and farm pump sets [28].

Money was tight. Autocar Professional reported that Neelkanth put in his life savings of about Rs 5 lakh, a couple of acquaintances matched it, and farmers from the sugar belt supplied the rest from their own small savings [32].

Baba Kalyani has described how hard those years were. His father “had to fight the license and permit Raj and the whole industrial scene was highly regulated. Just to get the factory running was so difficult,” he said in a 2008 speech [23].

Boarding school, machines and MIT

Babasaheb Neelkanth Kalyani was born in Pune on 7 January 1949, the elder son of Neelkanth and Sulochana Kalyani [5][22]. He had a younger brother, Gaurishankar, and a sister, Sugandha [34].

He was sent to the Rashtriya Military School in Belgaum (now Belagavi), a boarding school once known as King George’s Royal Indian Military School [22][31]. Holidays were spent at the Pune plant, getting his hands dirty [31].

He credits the school for his character. “When you are in a military school, there is very little room to manoeuvre the system and I think that discipline has stood me in good stead all my life,” he told The Machinist. “It has made me a very simple, straightforward kind of person. That also gets me into trouble sometimes as I am too candid” [31]. And he loved machines: “I liked machines right from my childhood, their feel, to be around them” [31]. Many of his classmates went on to become generals and air marshals, he told Forbes India in 2025, a link that would matter later [46].

He studied mechanical engineering at BITS Pilani, graduating with honours [2][22]. Then he went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for a Master of Science, completed in 1972 according to his IIT Mandi convocation profile [22].

America changed how he saw things. “My first flight on Air India from Bombay, getting into Boston to a totally a new place, new geography and not knowing anybody,” he recalled. He became president of the Indian Association at MIT and “bought my first car at $100” [23]. “It taught me to look at the broader picture,” he told Forbes. “I was struck by the openness in the U.S. economy and often wondered what our country could achieve if we were to transform into a full-fledged, market-driven economy” [28].

Coming home at 23

On 1 April 1972, aged 23, he joined Bharat Forge. Company records list no previous employer: this was his first and only job [2][28].

The company was small. The Economic Times put its size at about US$1.3 million in sales [30], while Autocar Professional said it had a turnover of Rs 3.75 crore and was “in the red” [32]. The two figures do not match, but both describe a small business. Forbes says he started in sales, helped upgrade the plant, and made the unit profitable in his first year [28].

The 1970s and 1980s were the licence-raj years, and the Kalyani group grew sideways. Kalyani Steels was set up in 1973 to make forging-quality steel [26]. Automotive Axles, a joint venture with America’s Rockwell International, was founded in 1981 [100]. The group even made colour televisions [35]. “We manufactured whatever we could get a license for,” Kalyani said later [37]. Looking back, he also said: “We missed one complete electronic industrial revolution” [32].

The first break

The “white elephant” of 1989

By the late 1980s, Kalyani had decided that cheap labour was a trap. “We were a lot like traditional Indian companies where we had low technology and lots of labor,” he told Forbes. “If it’s just low-cost labor, ten other guys can do it. But if you have innovation and technology, it’s not so easy for ten other guys to do it” [28].

In 1989 he decided to invest about Rs 100 crore in Bharat Forge’s first modern forging press line. The company’s total turnover was only about Rs 125 crore [29]. Interest rates were above 20% [28]. Friends advised against it, and critics called the project a “white elephant” [29][99]. According to The Machinist, even his father feared that his son was about to destroy a lifetime’s work [31].

“People thought I was nuts. Articles were written about this so-called white elephant,” Kalyani said. “It required huge investment, but it was that one decision that took our company from being a non-entity to where we are today” [31].

It was not smooth. The imported equipment was delayed and had teething trouble, and both presses were installed by 1991-92 [35]. The timing turned out to be lucky: India opened its economy in 1991, just as Bharat Forge had a modern plant to sell from.

Company filings show he joined the Bharat Forge board in March 1993 and became Chairman and Managing Director in August 1997 [1]. By then he had been setting the company’s direction for years.

The first American order

In 1993, Bharat Forge won its first big US order: about US$5 million of front axle beams for heavy trucks, from the Michigan axle business that later became part of ArvinMeritor [28]. (The Machinist dates the order to 1992 [31].) Forbes reports that the customer signed only after visiting the Pune plant [28].

That became the sales method. “Initially when we went to manufacturers in North America and Europe, we’d ask them to come and look at our facilities in India,” Kalyani said. “Most of them would be surprised to see that it was far more advanced than what they had back home. That’s when the export orders started coming in” [30].

He also changed who worked on the shop floor. ET reported that Kalyani saw the old Indian model of “muscle power not brain power” as uncompetitive. Unskilled workers were offered voluntary retirement, and the company hired engineers [30]. By 2005, about 1,500 of its 3,500 employees had engineering degrees, according to Forbes [28]. “India’s competitive strength has never been cheap labour; it is brain power,” he told Moneylife in 2006 [102].

By 2000, turnover had reached Rs 530 crore and exports were more than a fifth of sales. A second big press line was commissioned in March 2000 for Rs 145 crore, and customers included Meritor, Dana and Caterpillar [36]. Overseas revenue grew from US$13.3 million in 1996-97 to US$295 million in 2004-05 [28].

Building the empire

Going shopping in Germany (2003-2005)

In November 2003 Bharat Forge agreed to buy the business of Carl Dan Peddinghaus (CDP), a German forging company founded in 1839, effective 1 January 2004 [15]. CDP had revenue of 116 million euros and 790 employees, and supplied BMW, Volkswagen, Audi and DaimlerChrysler. The company said the deal made it the world’s second-largest forging company [15]. Forbes reported the price as 29 million euros [28].

More deals followed fast:

CDP Aluminiumtechnik, Germany, in December 2004 [38].
Federal Forge, Lansing, Michigan, bought out of bankruptcy for US$9.1 million in June 2005 [38].
Imatra Kilsta of Sweden, with its Scottish Stampings unit, in September 2005, for a reported price of about Rs 250 crore [39].
A majority-owned joint venture with China’s FAW group in December 2005 [40].

He called it “dual-shore” manufacturing: design and front-end work near customers in rich countries, and heavy manufacturing in India. “The endgame is to have technology front ends in the developed world and manufacturing front ends in low-cost destinations,” he told Forbes. “We want to be the world leader in our business” [28].

To pay for it, Bharat Forge sold global depositary receipts and two US$60 million tranches of foreign currency convertible bonds in April 2005 [1]. In 2004-05 its sales were about US$460 million and its market value about US$1.8 billion. The family owned about 35% [28]. Business Standard named him its CEO of the Year, and Business India made him Businessman of the Year 2006 [29][101].

Into power, and out again (2008-2018)

In November 2008, Bharat Forge and France’s Alstom announced joint ventures to make turbines and generators for big supercritical power plants [16]. The venture won orders from NTPC. But when General Electric bought Alstom’s energy business, Bharat Forge decided to exit. It sold its last 26% stake in Alstom Bharat Forge Power to GE in February 2018 for about US$35 million [45].

The big defence bet (2010-2026)

The bet that defines his later career began around 2010, when Bharat Forge’s sales passed US$1 billion. Kalyani decided to enter defence, starting with gun barrels [46]. In 2011 the company bought an artillery plant from Switzerland’s RUAG for 1.7 million Swiss francs and had it running in India within a year [46].

In 2012 it showed its first 155mm artillery gun at DefExpo in Delhi. Kalyani has recalled that army officers laughed and not one stopped to look [47]. In 2013, DRDO picked Bharat Forge as one of two production partners, with Tata Advanced Systems, for the Advanced Towed Artillery Gun System, or ATAGS [46].

He has argued for years that the private sector belongs in defence. In 2016 he told Defense News that defence reform “represents a big opportunity for the private industry” and could “help us establish a self-reliant vibrant defense base in the country” [92].

The defence work was moved into Kalyani Strategic Systems Ltd (KSSL), now wholly owned by Bharat Forge [1]. Then came exports:

In November 2022 KSSL announced a US$155.5 million artillery export order from a “non-conflict zone” customer, widely reported to be Armenia [50]. The Defense Post later reported that Armenia was testing Indian-made ATAGS guns [51]. KSSL has not officially named the buyer, and reports differ on which guns the order covered.
In August 2023, KSSL exported its first artillery system designed, developed and made in India [1].
In 2024 the company exported about 100 artillery guns to Europe, according to Forbes India [46].

The biggest prize came on 26 March 2025. The defence ministry signed contracts worth about Rs 6,900 crore for 307 ATAGS guns. Bharat Forge’s share was 60%, about 184 guns, and Tata Advanced Systems got the rest [48][49]. It was described as the first big towed-gun purchase since the Bofors deal of 1987 [48]. Kalyani called it a “proud moment” [48]. As of September 2026, the company said deliveries had not started and remained subject to procedural approvals [1].

By 30 June 2026, the defence order book stood at Rs 11,197 crore [1]. In June 2026, KSSL won a Rs 425.8 crore navy contract for marine gas-turbine generator sets, and a subsidiary is building an ammunition and propellant plant in Andhra Pradesh [1]. In January 2024 Kalyani said, “In the next few years, defence business may become bigger than our core business” [93].

Aerospace

In February 2015, Boeing gave Bharat Forge a multi-year contract to make titanium wing forgings for 737 aircraft [52]. In October 2025, it expanded its partnership with Rolls-Royce to make fan blades for Pearl business-jet engines [53]. The company says its aerospace revenue grew almost five times between 2020-21 and 2025-26 [1].

Buying at home

In the 2020s, Bharat Forge bought several Indian businesses:

Sanghvi Forging and Engineering, Vadodara, bought in 2021 through the insolvency process for about Rs 90 crore [56].
JS Autocast, Coimbatore, completed in July 2022 at an enterprise value of Rs 489.63 crore [55].
AAM India Manufacturing, American Axle’s Indian truck-axle business, agreed in October 2024 for Rs 544.53 crore [54] and completed on 1 July 2025. It was renamed K Drive Mobility Solutions [1].

The AAM deal was funded by a share sale to institutions in December 2024 that raised about Rs 1,650 crore. In September 2026 the company raised another Rs 2,000 crore at Rs 1,890 a share, with Singapore’s GIC the largest buyer [1][59].

The numbers today

In 2025-26, Bharat Forge’s consolidated revenue was Rs 16,812 crore and its profit was Rs 1,089 crore [1]. On 19 October 2026 its market value was about Rs 87,100 crore [60]. For readers tracking India’s manufacturing push, CapitalVia’s analysis of where India’s investment money is going gives useful context.

How the wealth is held

Baba Kalyani owns almost no Bharat Forge shares in his own name: 78,150 shares, or 0.02%, at 30 June 2026 [1]. The family controls the company through a network of investment companies. The promoter group held 44.07% before the September 2026 share sale and 43.12% after it, with no shares pledged [1][59]. The largest blocks are held by Kalyani Investment Company (13.24%), Sundaram Trading and Investment (11.56%) and KSL Holdings (9.68%) [1].

The group also controls listed companies such as Kalyani Steels, BF Utilities, BF Investment and Automotive Axles [1].

He is also well paid. His pay from Bharat Forge was Rs 46.9 crore in 2025-26, made up of salary plus a commission linked to profit [1]. In 2024-25 his pay was 256.69 times that of the company’s median employee [3].

Estimates of his wealth vary a lot. Forbes put him at No. 58 on India’s 100 Richest 2026 with US$5.0 billion, roughly Rs 47,800 crore at the August 2026 rate of about Rs 95.6 to the dollar [62][61]. Hurun valued “Baba Kalyani & family” at Rs 18,100 crore in 2023 and Rs 31,200 crore in 2024 [25][63]. His figure in the M3M Hurun India Rich List 2026 could not be confirmed in published reports, so it is not given here.

The setbacks and failures

The 2008-09 crash

The global financial crisis hit Bharat Forge hard because it depended on trucks and on exports. Consolidated profit for 2008-09 fell about 86%, to Rs 41 crore from Rs 291 crore [43]. In the June 2009 quarter, consolidated revenue fell about 54% and the company made a loss [44].

Kalyani was frank about it. “We were kind of carried away of just simply growing our business, call it market share or just topline numbers,” he told CNBC-TV18 in 2009. “This is the only lesson, the only hard lesson that we have learnt.” He added: “I don’t think I would have done things differently” [24].

China, and the long goodbye to Europe

The FAW joint venture in China never became the hoped-for platform. In January 2014 Bharat Forge sold its 51.85% stake to FAW for US$28.2 million, about Rs 175 crore, against about Rs 178 crore it had put in [41][42].

The German company that began the global expansion has now reached its end. In 2025-26 Bharat Forge began winding down steel forging at Bharat Forge CDP GmbH. In the April-June 2026 quarter it booked a Rs 330 crore provision for redundancy and restructuring costs, which turned the quarter into a consolidated loss of about Rs 90 crore. The company says the German unit “will cease to exist” once the restructuring is completed, expected by the end of 2027 [1][58].

The EV detour

Bharat Forge put money into electric vehicles through Kalyani Powertrain, which held stakes in Tork Motors in India and REFU Drive in Germany [1]. In August 2024 Amit Kalyani said of Tork: “We have written off all our investment in this company so far” [57]. In 2025-26, Bharat Forge wrote down its investment in Kalyani Powertrain by Rs 499.7 crore on a standalone basis, Rs 450.4 crore of it in the January-March quarter [1][58]. In July 2026, Kalyani Powertrain sold its 50% of REFU Drive for 12,500 euros [1].

Tariffs

US tariffs hurt in 2025-26. Bharat Forge’s North American truck-export revenue fell by half that year [1]. In August 2025 Kalyani told CNBC-TV18 that a 50% tariff was “undoable”, while adding that “all our customers are still supporting us” [94].

Controversies and allegations

No court or regulator has found Baba Kalyani personally guilty of any offence in the matters below. The SEBI cases were settled without admitting or denying the findings. The family cases are still pending. He does not appear among the disclosed buyers of electoral bonds between April 2019 and January 2024, according to the State Bank of India data published by the Election Commission [27].

The Hikal shares suit with his sister

Allegation: On 18 March 2023, Baba Kalyani’s sister Sugandha Hiremath and her husband Jaidev Hiremath, promoters of the chemicals company Hikal, sued him in the Bombay High Court [9][65]. They said family arrangements made with their parents in 1993-94 required the Hikal shares held by Kalyani companies, about 34% of Hikal, to pass to the Hiremath family [9][74]. They also sought to stop the Kalyani side from buying more Hikal shares [9].

Response: In court papers reported by Business Standard, Kalyani said the suit’s real aim was to block his attempt to buy more Hikal shares. He said the claim was time-barred because no transfer had been sought for 29 years, and that a later buyback arrangement had replaced the 1993 one [64]. He has called the 1994 document only a “note” by his father that is not legally binding [66]. In January 2025 the Kalyani side released a 2023 letter from the late banker N. Vaghul, which it said denied any arrangement on Hikal shares. Hikal has described the agreements as “valid and subsisting” [68].

What happened next:

December 2023: Hikal shareholders voted on a special resolution for Kalyani to stay on Hikal’s board after he turned 75. It got about 52% support, short of the 75% needed, so it failed. That ended a directorship that began in 1992 [76].
4 May 2026: the Bombay High Court refused the Hiremaths’ request to send the case to mediation without Kalyani’s consent. It noted that an earlier Supreme Court-ordered mediation in 2018-19 had failed [10][72].
13 July 2026: on Sugandha Hiremath’s appeal, the Supreme Court appointed former Supreme Court judge L. Nageswara Rao as mediator and put the court proceedings on hold while mediation runs. Kalyani’s lawyers opposed mediation [73][74][75].

Status: Pending. As of 19 October 2026 no settlement or ruling on the merits had been reported.

The partition claims over “family” assets

Allegation: In March 2024, Sugandha Hiremath’s children, Sameer Hiremath and Pallavi Swadi, filed a suit in Pune seeking partition of what they said was a Kalyani Hindu Undivided Family (HUF) estate. It included shares in Bharat Forge and other companies, land and jewellery, and their claimed one-ninth share was put at Rs 65,000-70,000 crore [66]. In September 2024 Sugandha herself sought one-third of family assets she says include about 250 companies and 76 properties, worth about Rs 1 lakh crore in all [68][69].

Response: Kalyani told the court that no such HUF exists, that the nephew and niece are Hiremaths by birth and have no standing, and that the suit “suppresses material facts” [66]. His side says he built Bharat Forge himself [69]. A group spokesperson called the nephew and niece’s suit “frivolous” [67].

What happened next:

July 2024: a mediation was attempted in Pune; later court orders record that it failed [67][10].
July 2026: these Pune cases are among the connected disputes covered by the Supreme Court’s mediation order [74].

Status: Pending. The Rs 1 lakh crore figure is the claimants’ own valuation and has not been tested in court.

His mother’s two wills and his brother’s allegations

Allegation: Their mother, Sulochana Kalyani, died in February 2023 and left two competing wills. A 2012 will gives Baba Kalyani the largest share, and its executors sought probate. His brother Gaurishankar Kalyani contested it and backed a December 2022 will instead, for which Gaurishankar’s son applied for probate [70]. An affidavit attributed to their mother, filed in the dispute, alleged that Baba Kalyani took control of Bharat Forge and Kalyani Steels from their father in 1992-94 and used coercion and undue influence over the 2012 will [70].

Response: The Kalyani Group said in September 2024 that their mother never gave him a power of attorney, that he had no role in litigation she started, and that the affidavit’s claims were “fabricated, incorrect and denied”. It called the campaign a “media trial” [71][70].

Status: Pending. The probate cases are before courts in Pune, and no court has ruled on either will.

Allegation: SEBI brought three sets of proceedings against Kalyani group entities:

In 2022, over gaps in Baba Kalyani’s disclosures as a Bharat Forge promoter. SEBI said some promoter-group companies had been left out of annual takeover-code disclosures from 2011 to 2021 [78].
In 2024, against Kalyani Investment Company, over related-party transactions with Kalyani Steels in 2013-15 that were not put before its audit committee [79].
In 2026, against Kalyani Steels, BF Utilities and a former compliance officer. An NSE examination had flagged investments in promoter-linked entities with “nil operations and negative net worth” and related-party deals that lacked the approvals and disclosures the rules require [80][81].

Response: In each case the parties used SEBI’s settlement process, paying without admitting or denying the findings: Rs 3 lakh in December 2022, Rs 1.12 crore in December 2024, and Rs 4.12 crore in all in February 2026 [78][79][80].

Status: Settled. No SEBI finding of insider trading or fraud against Baba Kalyani or Bharat Forge was found.

The German forging cartel fine

Allegation: In February 2021, Germany’s competition authority, the Bundeskartellamt, fined steel forging companies, including Bharat Forge’s two German subsidiaries, a total of about 35 million euros. It said the companies had exchanged competitively sensitive information through industry working groups from at least 2002 to 2016 [14].

Response: The subsidiaries settled, which reduced the fines. Bharat Forge set aside Rs 274 crore, payable over five years, which led to a consolidated loss of Rs 210 crore for the October-December 2020 quarter [82][1].

Status: Settled. The company’s filings show the German subsidiaries’ share as 32 million euros in instalments, the last due in September 2026 [1].

Reuters on Indian shells reaching Ukraine

Allegation: On 19 September 2024, Reuters reported, citing customs data and anonymous officials, that artillery shells made by Indian state-owned companies had been diverted to Ukraine by European buyers. In the same report, Kalyani Strategic Systems was named as one of the Indian companies whose exports of munitions components to Italy, the Czech Republic, Spain and Slovenia had risen sharply since 2022. Reuters did not tie any specific Ukraine shipment to KSSL [83][84].

Response: India’s foreign ministry called the report “speculative and misleading” [85]. No KSSL response was reported.

Status: A media report only. No government or court has made any finding against a Kalyani company.

The Khed SEZ and farmers’ complaints

Allegation: Khed Economic Infrastructure, a joint venture of Bharat Forge and the state industrial body MIDC, acquired land for a special economic zone near Rajgurunagar, Pune. In 2015 farmers complained that promised developed land and jobs had not come through and that share certificates they were given had no value. Their committee went to the Bombay High Court [86].

Response: Bharat Forge did not comment to Business Standard. Amit Kalyani had earlier blamed delays in state government decisions [86].

Status: In May 2018, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis cancelled the SEZ and said farmers had been cheated, and he waived stamp duty so that land could be returned [87]. No court ruling against Bharat Forge was found.

Investor votes on his pay and tenure

Allegation: In 2023, proxy advisers recommended voting against Kalyani’s five-year re-appointment as Managing Director. They pointed to his pay, about Rs 21 crore for 2022-23, and a commission about 2.5 times that of the next-highest executive director [77].

Response: The resolution passed with 75.45% of votes, just above the 75% needed for a director over 70. Promoters voted 100% in favour, while 53.51% of the public institutional votes cast were against [6][77].

Status: Re-appointed until 29 March 2028 [1].

BF Utilities filing lapse and a frozen demat account

Allegation: Bharat Forge’s September 2026 placement document said BF Utilities, a group company where Kalyani is a promoter and director, had not filed consolidated financial results for 2025-26 and the April-June 2026 quarter, as listing rules require. As a result, Kalyani’s personal demat account had been “suspended for debit” since 27 July 2026, so he could not sell or transfer shares held in it until the lapse was fixed [1].

Response: The document lists this as a disclosed risk. No public statement by Kalyani on it was found.

Status: Unresolved as of the September 2026 filing; no later update was found.

All controversies are listed as of 19 October 2026.

Giving back

Kalyani’s best-known personal cause is school education. He is founder-chairman of the Pratham Pune Education Foundation, set up in 2000, which runs learning programmes for children in Pune [20][22].

Most of the group’s giving goes through Bharat Forge’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) programme, whose committee he chairs [3]. In 2024-25 the company’s required CSR spend was Rs 30.6 crore. It spent Rs 24.5 crore in the year and moved the remaining Rs 6.1 crore into an unspent CSR account for ongoing projects, as the law allows [3]. The largest item, about Rs 11.3 crore, was village development (water storage, roads and livelihoods) across Satara, Pune, Ahilyanagar, Solapur and Kolhapur districts [3]. The 2025-26 CSR report says the programmes reached about 3.3 lakh people directly and that 1.35 lakh trees were planted that year [95].

No entry for him on the Hurun or EdelGive philanthropy lists was found, and he is not known for large personal donations.

His public role has been about policy and diplomacy. He chaired the commerce ministry’s 2018 review of India’s SEZ policy, which proposed renaming SEZs “Employment and Economic Enclaves” [88]. He sat on the Prime Minister’s Science, Technology and Innovation Advisory Council from 2018 [13]. He has co-chaired the Japan-India Business Leaders Forum since 2013 [12][89], and was founding president of the Society of Indian Defence Manufacturers [18].

Honours include:

The Padma Bhushan in 2008 [11].
France’s Legion of Honour in 2011 [17].
Germany’s Cross of the Order of Merit in 2012 [97].
Japan’s Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Star, in 2019 [12][98].
The Kiel Institute’s Global Economy Prize in 2009, shared with Sunil Bharti Mittal [21].

His convocation advice to IIM Bangalore graduates in 2023 sounded like his own life: “As individuals, we must stop expecting others, including the Government or society, to change first. We must instead make ourselves the pivots of change” [90].

Succession

His son, Amit Kalyani, studied mechanical engineering at Bucknell University in the US [19] and joined Bharat Forge in 1999 [1]. He became an executive director in 2004 [1] and in 2024 was named Vice-Chairman and Joint Managing Director for five years, from 11 May 2024 to 10 May 2029 [8][96]. Shareholders approved the appointment with 89.26% of votes [7]. He oversees the domestic and international businesses, ESG and growth strategy [1].

Baba Kalyani, now 77, holds his chairman and MD role until March 2028 [1]. No formal succession plan has been published. Back in 2013, asked about handing over, he told Business Standard: “I still have few years left” [91]. The Vice-Chairman title points to Amit as the heir. The family court cases are the open question: claims to the holding structure that sits above Bharat Forge are still before the courts.

What his journey teaches

Bet the company on capability, not on cheap labour. In 1989 Kalyani spent close to a year’s turnover on presses while critics called it a white elephant [29]. His reasoning, that anyone can copy low wages but few can copy technology, is what later won the American and European orders [28].

Let the customer see the factory. Bharat Forge won Western buyers by inviting them to Pune, where they found a plant more advanced than their own [30]. Showing the product did more than any sales pitch.

Use rejection as a target. The European executive who nearly threw him out in 1995 later gave Bharat Forge all of that business [30].

Pull out when a bet stops working. China, the power-equipment venture, the EV unit and now the first German plant were all exited or written down [41][45][58]. Sticking with what works also means cutting what does not, even when it costs hundreds of crores.

Settle family ownership early. Much of the empire is held through private family companies, and a disputed family arrangement from the early 1990s has led to more than three years of litigation at the Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court [74]. Clear agreements, made while everyone is alive and on speaking terms, matter as much as the business itself.

A new field can take a decade to pay off. The army officers who laughed at his gun in 2012 were buying it in 2025 [47][48]. Defence took about 15 years to go from idea to the company’s biggest order.

A profile for general reading, based on public records and reporting as of 19 October 2026. Not investment, tax or legal advice.

Baba Kalyani: Bharat Forge Chairman Biography

Where it began

A farmer who chose factories

Boarding school, machines and MIT

Coming home at 23

The first break

The “white elephant” of 1989

The first American order

Building the empire

Going shopping in Germany (2003-2005)

Into power, and out again (2008-2018)

The big defence bet (2010-2026)

Aerospace

Buying at home

The numbers today

How the wealth is held

The setbacks and failures

The 2008-09 crash

China, and the long goodbye to Europe

The EV detour

Tariffs

Controversies and allegations

The Hikal shares suit with his sister

The partition claims over “family” assets

His mother’s two wills and his brother’s allegations

The German forging cartel fine

Reuters on Indian shells reaching Ukraine

The Khed SEZ and farmers’ complaints

Investor votes on his pay and tenure

BF Utilities filing lapse and a frozen demat account

Giving back

Succession

What his journey teaches

Sources (102)

Frequently asked questions

More stories

Where it began

A farmer who chose factories

Boarding school, machines and MIT

Coming home at 23

The first break

The “white elephant” of 1989

The first American order

Building the empire

Going shopping in Germany (2003-2005)

Into power, and out again (2008-2018)

The big defence bet (2010-2026)

Aerospace

Buying at home

The numbers today

How the wealth is held

The setbacks and failures

The 2008-09 crash

China, and the long goodbye to Europe

The EV detour

Tariffs

Controversies and allegations

The Hikal shares suit with his sister

The partition claims over “family” assets

His mother’s two wills and his brother’s allegations

SEBI settlements over disclosures and related-party deals

The German forging cartel fine

Reuters on Indian shells reaching Ukraine

The Khed SEZ and farmers’ complaints

Investor votes on his pay and tenure

BF Utilities filing lapse and a frozen demat account

Giving back

Succession

What his journey teaches

Sources (102)

Frequently asked questions

More stories