NEW DELHI: Muthoot Group Chairman MG George Muthoot passed away in Delhi on Friday evening. He was 72 years old. He was a former trustee of the Orthodox Church.

He was born on November 2, 1949, in Kozhencherry, Pathanamthitta. George Muthoot was one of the six Malayalees who made it to the Forbes Magazine's Rich List last year.

The 722-year-old Muthoot was for long based in the National Capital even though his diversified group that runs over 20 businesses from gold loans to securities, realty estate to infrastructure, hospitals to hospitality and education, is headquartered in Kochi making it one of the largest business houses in the state. The company had not issued any statement till the filing of the story and its spokesperson could not be reached for confirmation.

After graduating from the Manipal Institute of Technology with a degree in mechanical engineering, Muthoot joined the family business as an office assistant and in 1979 he became the managing director and group chairman in February 1993.

In the early 1980s, the large family broke up and the family empire was divided between the cousin brothers and this led to the creation of Muthoot Pappachen Group, another diversified group in the state which runs rival gold loan company Muthoot Fincorp.

The Muthoot Group's flagship Muthoot Finance had a loan book of close to Rs 56,000 crore in the December 2020 quarter. The group has grown manifold under him--when he took over it had just 31 branches but has over 5,550 branches across the country and outside today and the group. Muthoot leaves behind wife Sara George and two sons. While eldest son George M George is the executive director of the group, the youngest son Alexander George is the director of the group and the second son Paul Muthoot George was murdered in 2009.

He was also a member of the national executive committee of Ficci and headed the Ficci Kerala council.

Forbes Asia listed him as the 44th richest Indian in 2020 with close to USD5 billion assets and the richest Keralite.