Rajesh Exports Fraud Case: Who is he? Mehta, once seen as the quiet architect behind India’s global gold success, built Rajesh Exports from a ₹1,200 borrowed start into a multinational refining giant. What started as smaller silver trading in the 1980s, slowly morphed into a wider value-chain gold empire, with global reach pushed along by the Swiss acquisition of Valcambi. For years, he was treated as a low-key, execution-driven billionaire with a keen mind for arbitrage and scale. But now his name is right at the middle of intense scrutiny, after SEBI flagged major financial irregularities. The contrast feels almost unreal: from a celebrated wealth creator to one of the most closely observed corporate cases in recent memory.
From ₹1,200 to A Gold Empire: The Rise Of Rajesh Mehta
Rajesh Mehta’s journey, starts in Gujarat back in 1964, where he was born in modest circumstances and at first wanted to become a doctor. But because of money problems, his direction changed into business, and that move later rewrote his whole life. He studied at St. Joseph’s School and National College in Bengaluru, then he entered the trading world with only ₹1,200 that he borrowed from his elder brother. In the early 1980s, he began quietly, trading silver jewellery, picking up, step by step, how the regional price differences between Chennai and Gujarat could be used for steady gains.
At first it felt like plain arbitrage, but gradually it turned into organised jewellery dealing with more scale and a bit more structure. By 1989, Rajesh Exports was co-founded with his brother Prashant Mehta, and they built a full value-chain setup, covering refining, manufacturing, and retail. Later on, the business pushed further into global gold refining and distribution, including the Shubh Jewellers retail chain in Karnataka, and from there it grew into a large, international gold processing empire.
Global Breakthrough For Rajesh Mehta: From Domestic Refining To Swiss Precision Powerhouse
The turning point in Rajesh Mehta’s global ambitions came in 2015, when he acquired Valcambi SA, a Switzerland-based company that is widely viewed as one of the world’s most important gold refining facilities. In a way, it didn’t only widen Rajesh Exports’ footprint, it also sort of plugged the firm straight into the main global gold supply chains, you could say. Once Valcambi was in the portfolio, the company’s international refining and distribution know-how got stronger, plus the management started getting consistent visibility via Fortune listings, which felt like an unmistakable arrival on the global corporate stage.
Then by 2017, Forbes put Rajesh Mehta’s estimated net worth at about $2.6 billion, and that placed him among India’s more prominent billionaire businessmen. Even with that kind of scale though, he kept a low-profile, execution-first leadership approach, so he often stayed away from the spotlight while the business expanded aggressively across global markets.
SEBI Action Against Rajesh Exports: Deep Regulatory Scrutiny Unfolds, On Over 15 Lakh Fraud
SEBI’s 2026 interim findings against Rajesh Exports and its Chairman Rajesh Mehta mark one of the most serious regulatory reviews in recent years, with alleged financial misstatements running across FY21–FY25. The regulator says it has found a reported ₹15.15 lakh crore revenue mismatch, and argues that almost 97–99% of consolidated revenues were routed through foreign subsidiaries, which then raises the usual red flags about financial transparency, and also about consolidation practices that feel not fully clear. It also pointed to inconsistencies in Valcambi SA’s reported figures versus the group accounts, and this has intensified scrutiny on overseas reporting structures, more or less.
On the transaction side, SEBI alleges that derivative trades worth around ₹11,487 crore were incorrectly recorded as company sales and purchases, plus there may be diversion of nearly ₹339 crore into personal accounts. These findings have been called “egregious” and “systemic”, so SEBI issued a 109-page interim order on June 3, 2026, and also referred the matter to NFRA for auditor examination. Right now, a forensic investigation covering FY20–FY24 is underway.
For immediate steps, Rajesh Mehta has been barred from the securities market for three years, and trading restrictions have been placed on the company as well as on the promoters, while the probe continues.
Also Read: Explosive SEBI Crackdown: Rajesh Exports Fraud Shock Hits LIC….
