Seth Shiv Narayan Birla

Seth Shiv Narayan Birla (1840 to 1909) was an Indian trader from Pilani in the Shekhawati region of Rajasthan, and the first of his family to venture outside the town. He took part in the cotton trade that carried goods from the hinterland to the railhead at Ahmedabad and on to Bombay for export, and with his adopted son Baldeo Das Birla he made a large fortune trading opium with China, which became the basis of the family's wealth. As his means and confidence grew he began chartering cargo ships in partnership with other Marwari tradesmen, bypassing British middlemen, and in 1863 he moved to Bombay. He had no children of his own, and by the early 1880s he had passed his business interests to Baldeo Das, who established the Bombay trading house Shivnarayan Baldeodas. The CKA Birla Group, an Indian conglomerate headquartered in New Delhi, dates its founding to him in 1862.