 when he topped the list of Asia's wealthiest people compiled by Forbes magazine in 2017. Now he is being investigated over suspected "illegal crimes" as his company teeters under the weight of $300bn (£245.4bn) of debt. Born into a poor rural family in 1958, his early childhood was shaped by the Great Leap Forward - Mao Zedong's campaign to rapidly industrialise a Chinese economy reliant on agriculture triggered a famine that killed millions. Mr Hui was raised by his grandmother in a village in central Henan province after his mother died of sepsis when he was just eight months old. After graduating from university in 1982, he spent the next decade working as a steel technician before becoming a salesman for a property developer in the city of Guangzhou in southern China. It was there that he founded Evergrande in 1996. The company expanded rapidly as China's economy boomed by borrowing large amounts of money. Image source, Getty Images Image caption, Hui Ka Yan (C) at a business summit in Guangzhou in 2019 "He was an example of how anybody can become rich if you're smart enough and if you work hard enough," said Alicia Garcia Herrero, the chief economist for Asia-Pacific at French investment bank Natixis. Mr Hui, who has been a Communist Party member for more than three decades, was elected in 2008 as a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. The elite group of government officials and business leaders is the country's top advisory body. A photograph of him at a party conference wearing a gold-buckled belt made by the French luxury label Hermès went viral on social media in 20){kind=link}
Hui Ka Yan, the founder and chairman of Chinese property giant Evergrande, was once Asia’s richest person.
The 64-year-old, who is also known as Xu Jiayin, rose from a humble upbringing to head a vast business empire. His fortune was estimated at $42.5bn (£34.8bn) when he topped the list of Asia’s wealthiest people compiled by Forbes magazine in 2017.
Now he is being investigated over suspected “illegal crimes” as his company teeters under the weight of $300bn (£245.4bn) of debt.
Born into a poor rural family in 1958, his early childhood was shaped by the Great Leap Forward – Mao Zedong’s campaign to rapidly industrialise a Chinese economy reliant on agriculture triggered a famine that killed millions.
Mr Hui was raised by his grandmother in a village in central Henan province after his mother died of sepsis when he was just eight months old.