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Billionaire's post on 'spirit of Mumbai' after heavy rain batters city, damages roads and disrupts local trains
Billionaire Harsh Goenka shared a video on X taking a dig at the city’s flood woes, calling it the ‘spirit of Mumbai.’
As heavy rains inundated Mumbai and brought train services to a standstill on Monday, Indian billionaire with a net worth of $4 billion, Harsh Goenka took to the social media platform X to share a video, sarcastically captioning it ‘spirit of Mumbai.’
Also read: Kemps Corner road disintegrates after heavy rainfall in Mumbai, traffic disrupted
The clip showed a blue off-road vehicle battling its way through a deeply rutted and muddy dirt road, seemingly overwhelmed by the harsh terrain. As the Chairman of RPG Enterprises, the parent company of tyre manufacturer CEAT, Goenka shared the video with a tongue-in-cheek caption: “I hope you have the perfect tyres to go to work to uphold the ‘spirit of Mumbai’ #MumbaiRains.”
However, the video isn't recent. It had originally been posted in 2024 by Anand Mahindra, Chairman of the Mahindra Group, who had reshared the clip from video creator Josh Koelbel. The footage features a modified Mahindra Jeep being skilfully driven across a challenging off-road trail. Mahindra’s caption had read: “You’ll get to your destination… No matter how tough the road…”
Take a look at the video:
Businessman trolled for Mumbai local video
The phrase ‘spirit of Mumbai’ in the RPG Group chairman's recent caption echoes an earlier post that sparked backlash. In that widely circulated video, he had shared footage of women hurriedly scrambling to board an overcrowded Mumbai local train.
Also read: Businessman worth $4 billion trolled for Mumbai local video. His cryptic clarification
“Daily life in Mumbai… what we call the ‘spirit of Mumbai’!” he had captioned that post.
Though many in Mumbai refer to their collective resilience as the “spirit of Mumbai,” Goenka’s romantic take, especially coming from a billionaire, did not sit well with many.
“It’s survival... not spirit. Expecting even basic dignity in public transport is a struggle in this country,” one user had written.
Another asked: “Are you mocking them? Why don't you travel just a week like them! People like you who have means to make some meaningful change, yet indulge in 'poverty porn', are the real parasites of this society.”
Goenka responded with a cryptic clarification to one critical comment of an X user named Samir Shah.
“No, Mr. Harsh. This is not Spirit of Mumbai, this is Majboori of Mumbaikar,” wrote Shah.
Goenka replied, hinting that his post was meant to be sarcastic: “Understand sarcasm,” he wrote.
