Bengaluru's Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw opts for metro travel over luxury car, accompanied by ‘Namma Metro friend’

Bengaluru billionaire Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw ditched her luxury vehicles for a ride on the city’s metro this Tuesday, opting to travel via the Namma Metro purple line to escape Bengaluru’s notorious traffic congestion.

Sharing her experience on the social media platform X, the Biocon Limited founder expressed surprise at the efficiency of the metro journey and praised the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation for providing a “great ride.”

Shaw was accompanied by her friend Jennifer Erich, whom she referred to as the “Iron Lady at Exxon Mobil.” Erich, according to her LinkedIn profile, holds the position of Geoscience Manager at Exxon Mobil’s Bengaluru Technology Centre.

“Took the purple line from Whitefield to Vidhana with my Namma Metro friend Jennifer Erich, the Iron Lady of Exxon Mobil. Such a quick way to avoid traffic. Great ride. Thanks BMRCL,” Mazumdar-Shaw wrote on X.

Jennifer Erich responded to the post by saying she was happy to have introduced Namma Metro to Shaw.

“So happy to be your Metro Mentor!! Thanks so much for joining me at my office today,” she replied.

Online audiences expressed strong appreciation for Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw’s humble and relatable gesture. “Great to see famous personalities doing this and sharing - very important to have more people take public transport,” wrote one person. “When the affluent, influential, and elite embrace public transport, it catalyzes systemic investment and inspires emulation among the masses, dismantling car-centric aspirations and heralding a shift toward sustainable urban mobility,” another said.

What is Namma Metro?

Namma Metro, commonly referred to as Bengaluru Metro, is the rapid transit network serving Bengaluru, the capital of Karnataka. The system is managed by the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL), a partnership between the Government of India and the Government of Karnataka.

Currently, Namma Metro operates two lines: the purple line and the green line.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw is not the first billionaire to opt for public transport. In 2023, real estate tycoon Niranjan Hiranandani took a Mumbai local train to “save time and beat the traffic.”