Initial public offering

Dhirubhai Ambani is credited with starting the equity cult in India. More than 58,000 investors from various parts of India subscribed to Reliances IPO in 1977. Dhirubhai was able to convince large number of small investors from rural Gujarat that being shareholders of his company would be profitable.Reliance Industries was the first private sector company whose Annual General Meetings were held in stadiums. In 1986, The Annual General Meeting of Reliance Industries was held in Cross Maidan, Mumbai and was attended by more than 350,000 shareholders and the Reliance family.Dhirubhai managed to convince a large number of first time retail investors to invest in Reliance.Ambanis net worth was estimated at about Rs.1 billion by early 1980s.