Sudhir Choudhrie was born on September 1949 and is an Indian-born and London-based businessman with interests in healthcare, aviation, and hospitality.
23 Facts About Sudhir Choudhrie
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Sudhir Choudhrie was born in September 1949, and raised in Delhi by his mother, after his father's early death.
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Sudhir Choudhrie has a bachelor's degree in Economics from the University of Delhi.
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Sudhir Choudhrie's business developed as an exporter of consumer goods including farm machinery, initially particularly focused on the Soviet Union, then India's largest trading partner.
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Sudhir Choudhrie founded the Magnum International Trading Company Ltd in 1975, where he focused on export markets.
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Sudhir Choudhrie was a director of the chartered airline companies Deccan Aviation Ltd and Kingfisher Airlines.
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Sudhir Choudhrie was a non-executive director of Ebookers, a travel website, from 1999 to 2005.
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From 1993 to 2004, Sudhir Choudhrie served as Latvia's Honorary Consul General to India.
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In July 2013 the Daily Telegraph alleged that Sudhir Choudhrie had been denied a peerage because of concerns about the treatment of patients by the Alpha Hospital Group.
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Sudhir Choudhrie is thought to have a long-term interest in the defence trade and has been described as "one of India's key arms dealers".
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Sudhir Choudhrie was allegedly blacklisted by the Indian government due to being suspected of "corrupt or irregular practice", following several investigations into his companies.
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In February 2014, Sudhir Choudhrie was detained by the Serious Fraud Office in a bribery investigation into Rolls-Royce Holdings.
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Sudhir Choudhrie denied any wrongdoing, was never charged and was released on bail without conditions.
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In 2017 Sudhir Choudhrie published From My Heart: A Tale of Love, Life and Destiny, an autobiographical work focusing on his early life, long term heart condition and experience of a heart transplant operation.
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Sudhir Choudhrie has been a longstanding benefactor of Green Templeton College at the University of Oxford, where a Library has been named in his honour.
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Sudhir Choudhrie holds an honorary Radcliffe fellowship at the college and has supported the annual GTC Emerging Markets Symposium since it began in 2007.
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Sudhir Choudhrie is a benefactor of the Columbia University Medical Center in New York City, where a professorship in Cardiology has been established in his name.
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Sudhir Choudhrie is married to Anita and they have two sons, Bhanu and Dhairya.
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Sudhir Choudhrie suffered from the same genetic heart condition that led to the early death of his brother Rajiv in 1998.
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Sudhir Choudhrie is one of the longest surviving heart transplant recipients in the world and has described surviving the operation as his "greatest achievement".
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The wealth of the Sudhir Choudhrie family is estimated at US$2 billion.
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Sudhir Choudhrie enjoys restoring vintage cars and has one of the finest private collections in India.
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Sudhir Choudhrie owns works by Damian Hirst, Andy Warhol and Anish Kapoor.