Sahara Group founder and chairman Subrata Roy died on Tuesday at a Mumbai hospital after battling a long illness, the company said in a statement. He was 75. Subrata Roy is survived by his wife Swapna Roy and two sons, Sushanto and Seemanto Roy, who live abroad.

Born in Bihar’s Araria in 1948, Subrata Roy’s journey to build the Sahara India Pariwar began in 1978.

Roy’s family later moved from Bihar to Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh. Subsequently, Subrata Roy shifted to Lucknow in the 1990s and made the city the headquarters of his group.

Having created a huge business empire across retail, real estate and financial services sectors, Roy was at the centre of a huge controversy and faced multiple regulatory and legal battles in connection with his group firms that were accused of circumventing regulations with Ponzi schemes, allegations his group always denied.

His troubles began in November 2010 when Sebi asked two entities of the Sahara group not to mobilise funds from equity markets or from issuance of any security to the public while restraining Roy from approaching the public to raise money.

Roy was arrested in 2014 on the orders of the Supreme Court after he failed to appear before it in a contempt case arising out of non-refund of more than Rs 20,000 crore to investors by two of his companies.

He was admitted to Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital and Medical Research Institute in Mumbai on Sunday after his health deteriorated.

“His loss will be deeply felt by the entire Sahara India Pariwar,” the company said.