Who spent the most on building? Reliance.

What the chart shows

In the year to March 2026, Reliance spent ₹1,22,916 crore across its whole group on things that last for years, like plants, machines and towers: the most of the 4,110 listed companies whose yearly accounts show this spending, and ₹77,740 crore more than Airtel.

Next: Vedanta, ₹20,876 crore. 4 of the ten are power companies. 4 are government companies.

What this is: the cash each company paid during the year for land, buildings, plants, machines and other things that last for years, from its yearly accounts. For a company that owns others, it is the whole group's spending, including companies it owns outside India (Hindalco's includes its aluminium business abroad). What it is not: profit, or a sign that a company is good or bad. Some of this money may be borrowed. A company's own announced figure can differ, because it may count spending when the work is done rather than when the cash is paid.

How it is measured

The figure is the cash each company paid during the year to March 2026 for things that last for years: land, buildings, plants, machines, towers and other equipment. It is the line "purchase of property, plant and equipment" in the cash part of the company's yearly accounts (its cash flow statement). Companies file this line in different ways: some (Reliance among them) include rights such as airwaves (spectrum) and software in it.

For a company that owns others, the figure is the whole group's (consolidated), because a group often builds through the companies it owns; this includes companies it owns outside India (Hindalco's includes Novelis, its aluminium business abroad). A company whose group accounts carry no figure is counted on its own accounts (standalone). Where a year has more than one version on file, the latest is used.

A company's own announced spending figure can differ from this one, because it may count spending when the work is done rather than when the cash is paid. 5,331 listed companies filed full-year results for the year; 4,110 show this spending. A zero in these accounts can mean "not reported" as well as "spent nothing", so no count of companies that spent nothing is given. As a check against reading errors, a company is ranked only when its figure is no bigger than everything it owned at the end of the year and, where it reported one the year before, between 0.2 and 5 times that figure; 3,489 are ranked and 621 are set aside (0 bigger than everything the company owned, 290 under 0.2 times last year, 331 over 5 times last year); none of them is as big as the 10th figure here.

Of the companies that show no figure for the year, 1,070 can be shown to sit below the ten (5 times their figure for the year before, or everything they own, is smaller than the 10th figure); the same check clears 70 groups whose own group accounts carry no figure. 41 banks are not counted: the accounts we hold carry no figure for this line for any bank. 4 large companies show no figure for the year and cannot be checked against the ten: Oil India (₹12,969 crore the year before); Reliance Communications (none reported the year before either); Maharashtra Scooters (none reported the year before either); NLC India's group accounts (₹7,340 crore the year before). 22 more have no figures at all for the year in the accounts we hold, mostly companies whose year ends in December (R Systems International, Varun Beverages, ABB India, Kennametal India, Foseco India, Schaeffler India, Stovec Industries, John Cockerill India and others); they cannot be checked. On the companies' own accounts alone (not their groups'), Reliance is also first: ₹34,143 crore, ahead of ONGC at ₹27,507 crore. No total of the ten is given: a group's figure includes the companies it owns, and the data we hold cannot rule out one of the ten sitting inside another's group.

This spending is not profit. It says nothing about whether a company is good, cheap or well run, and some of it may be paid for with borrowed money.

Using this chart