His wealth is in the same league as that of Indian steel baron Lakshmi Mittal, though he has little of Mittal’s flash and swagger. Nevertheless, Ambani is a source of endless fascination to his fellow Indians, his every move tracked by the local tabloids. Within a new culture celebrating money and success—especially in Mumbai, where ostentatious shows of wealth are de rigueur—he’s a hero, a Bollywood-worthy representative of the country’s prosperity and self-confidence. But he’s also one of India’s most polarizing figures, a businessman famous for bulldozing anyone who resists his intentions to expand his old-line industrial companies and whose extreme riches conflict with the country’s Gandhian leanings. His success with pushing his epic projects through in a place that’s infamous for its crippling bureaucracy prompts questions among his countrymen about his close ties to government officials. Controversy over his many plans—from the new house to his displacement of farmers to establish free-trade zones—highlights the costs of endless expansion and whether Ambani’s approach can be reconciled with the more traditional, understated “Indian” way.

Securing face time with India’s richest resident requires patience, as Ambani’s world is padded with layers of minions to shield him from public scrutiny. Scheduled appointments mysteriously never take place, and phone calls are rarely returned when expected; Ambani is big enough to make people wait.

Indeed, it’s a marvel that Ambani can accomplish anything at all, given the chaos swirling around him. He is known to stay up until late into the night, tapping out emails and holding meetings—and watching Bollywood movies. He frequently rolls into his headquarters well after noon, and there is rarely any fixed daily schedule; the staff is perpetually scrambling on its own unpredictable Ambani time.

On a recent evening in the middle of monsoon season, Ambani paced around his South Mumbai offices, receiving confidants, supplicants, and guests. He is known for an obsession with personal safety, and the suite of offices that forms his company’s nerve center is said to be layered with security hardware that is state-of-the-art. He rarely goes outside for fear of being mobbed.

With a stocky build and the same shiny, unnaturally jet-black hair favored by Indian movie stars and politicians of a certain age, Ambani seems restless and agitated, bobbing his head from side to side when he talks, his gaze flitting around the room. “I speak by my actions,” he declares. He sits in a white armchair, not far from the life-size painting in the entryway of Mohandas Gandhi—against whom he strikes a marked philosophical contrast.

Despite Ambani’s casual attitude toward time commitments, he is exacting when it comes to what he’ll talk about: He doesn’t like to be pinned down with inquiries about his business or the effects of his actions on his developing country. The sight of a tape recorder will send him into a fit. Rather, he speaks elliptically about lofty big-picture issues, such as India’s greatness and its place in the world. “We are in the midst of many expansions. These are in different industries, with different interests. We are crossing many bridges,” he says vaguely. Alluding to the controversy surrounding him, he says, “Whenever we cross one bridge, there is lots of friction.”

India is often described as a land of extremes, and the characterization now seems particularly apt. The country is experiencing an extraordinary period of economic expansion—a turbocharged state of change that can be baffling to an outsider and that makes its claim to superpower status seem slightly ahead of itself. While it’s true that the economy grew 9.4 percent last year, empowering a rising middle class, much of that wealth is concentrated in small pockets of the country. Outside of those bubbles, poverty and simmering class tension are as pronounced as ever. “There is an astonishing amount of wealth creation going on in India, but it’s disproportionately accruing to a few, which is creating a crisis in the system,” says Ravi Venkatesan, the chairman of Microsoft India. “If 780 million people don’t share in this wealth-creation process, in a democracy, can this continue? The answer is no.”