“I make it a point that every birthday of my son, from the age of 21, I give him one [a Ferrari]. He has one of the largest collections… he has got 11 of them now,” Lalit Modi said in a recent interview. His son Ruchir is 31 (turns 32 in September 2026). This gift-giving ritual that says everything about the way the IPL’s founder inhabits the world.
Modi, the cricket administrator who built India’s most lucrative sporting property from the ground up before his spectacular fall from grace – suspended by the BCCI in 2010 and banned for life in 2013 – has spent the years since living in London with a lifestyle that appears entirely untouched by legal proceedings or a lifetime ban from the BCCI.
His net worth is estimated at approximately $570 million (around Rs 4,555 crore), according to reports by Aaj Tak and GQ India – a fortune built on his inherited stake in Modi Enterprises, his years at the helm of the IPL, and real estate holdings in the United Kingdom.
Ferraris as a family language
The Modi family does not send flowers. It sends Ferraris. According to reports by CarDekho and CarToq, the exchange has gone both ways – Modi’s late wife Minal gifted him a Ferrari California, while his son Ruchir presented him with a Ferrari F12 Berlinetta, complete with a personalised number plate reading “CRI3KET”, on his 50th birthday.
Modi in turn gifted Ruchir a Ferrari 812 GTS. As per Koimoi, the 812 GTS carries an ex-showroom price in India of around Rs 5.75 crore.
Apart from the Ferraris, Modi’s fleet of wheels – reported by CarDekho and CarToq – includes a Ferrari 488 Pista Spider (with a “MODI IR” registration plate), a McLaren 720S, a Bentley Mulsanne Speed, a BMW 7-Series 760 Li, and multiple Mercedes-Benz S-Class and G63 AMG models. The combined value of his Ferrari holdings alone has been reported at over Rs 15 crore.
A mansion on Sloane Street and a business empire in dispute
The cars are parked, metaphorically speaking, outside a five-storey mansion on Sloane Street in London’s Chelsea district. According to an NDTV report, the property spans 7,000 square feet and contains 14 rooms, eight double bedrooms, seven bathrooms, four reception rooms, two kitchens, and a built-in elevator – rented at a reported Rs 12 lakh per month before Modi took it on a long lease.
The business backdrop is considerably more complicated. Modi Enterprises, the family conglomerate founded by his grandfather Gujar Mal Modi in 1933, is valued at over Rs 12,000 crore, per Aaj Tak.
Its listed flagship, Godfrey Phillips India – the producer of Marlboro and Benson & Hedges in India – reported gross sales of Rs 11,271 crore and a net profit of Rs 884 crore in fiscal 2024, according to Live Mint.
However, Lalit Modi’s share in that empire remains contested. He is embroiled in a long-running legal battle with his mother Bina Modi and sister Charu Modi over the KK Modi Family Trust, following the death of patriarch KK Modi in 2019. The dispute, which has reached the Supreme Court of India, centres on control of Godfrey Phillips and the distribution of family assets worth approximately Rs 11,000 crore, according to reporting on the matter.
In January 2023, Lalit Modi announced on social media that he had named Ruchir his successor and beneficiary in the KK Modi Family Trust – the young man who, by his father’s own account, now holds one of the world’s more unusual Ferrari collections. At 31, with 11 of them to his name, Ruchir Modi may well be just getting started.