Guptas send out nine-page invitation to R100m wedding

The controversial Gupta family’s reputation for lavish weddings precedes them, with the 2013 Sun City marriage of Vega Gupta to Aakash Jahajgarhi having made the family a household name in South Africa after they caused outrage by landing a plane full of more than 100 wedding-bound guests at Waterkloof airforce base.

Now, Amabhungane reports that the family is spending an estimated R100 million on a double wedding that will see both Rajesh ‘Tony’ Gupta’s daughter and Atul Gupta’s son tie the knot.

A nine-page wedding invitation was sent out for the five-day celebration, to take place at the Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates between February 19 and 23.

The R100 million the Guptas are believed to be spending actually sees them cutting costs compared to their last lavish wedding. Ajay Gupta’s son Kamal Singhala got married in Turkey in 2016, at a celebration believed to have cost R154 million, and which took place just after the family had skipped the country, leaving South Africa due to the many allegations of state capture that were catching up with them.

Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Picture: TripSavvy.

The controversial landing in 2013 of a Gupta-owned jet at the Waterkloof Air Force Base signalled then president Jacob Zuma auctioning his executive authority to a third party – “an insult to those who died for freedom in South Africa”, said former mineral resources minister Ngoako Ramatlhodi when testifying at the Zondo commission of inquiry into state capture at the end of November, last year.

In 2017, two years after the controversial wedding made headlines, email evidence exposed how, in 2015, they were allowed to use the military base again.

According to the Sunday Times, the Guptas’ aircraft, ZS-OAK, was allowed to depart from Waterkloof for Sishen, in the Northern Cape. An email from Ashu Chawla‚ chief executive of Sahara Computers, shows this occurred.

Defence department spokesperson Siphiwe Dlamini confirmed to the Sunday Times that the Gupta plane was authorised to use Waterkloof for “military and civilian dignitaries to the South African Army Combat Training Centre in Lohatla‚ Northern Cape”.

“These dignitaries and captains of the defence industry were invited to attend the 2015 edition of ‘Exercise Amani Africa’‚ a force preparation exercise with various regional militaries,” said Dlamini.

(Compiled by Daniel Friedman. Additional reporting by Brian Sokutu)

For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.