How Amitabh Bachchan bought land in Ayodhya: Abhinandan Lodha recalls receiving a surprise call around 3 AM; Rs 15 crore reached his account the next morning

When Abhinandan Lodha, founder of The House of Abhinandan Lodha, glanced at his phone while in Australia in 2023, he saw a couple of missed calls and a message that stopped him cold.

It read: "This is Amitabh Bachchan, please call back when convenient."

"I literally stood up and called him back," Lodha recalled, speaking at the Hindustan Times India Next Real Estate Summit 2026.


It was around 3 am.

What Big B wanted

The conversation that followed was brief and to the point. Bachchan told Lodha he was from Uttar Pradesh and wanted to buy land in Ayodhya. Lodha said he would make it happen.

Then came the question about price.

"I replied, 'How can I talk pricing with you?'" Lodha recalled. Bachchan pressed on regardless. He said he was looking at 15,000 sq ft. Lodha told him it would be around Rs 15 crore.

The next morning, Rs 15 crore had been transferred.

A portfolio that has only grown since

That late-night call turned out to be just the beginning. Bachchan has since made Ayodhya a recurring destination for his real estate investments, each one larger than the last.

In 2024, he purchased a 10,000 sq ft plot in HoABL's flagship mixed-use development, The Sarayu, for Rs 14.5 crore. A year later, in May 2025, he bought a 25,000 sq ft plot adjacent to the same project for nearly Rs 40 crore.

Most recently, in March 2026, Bachchan acquired a 2.67-acre land parcel worth Rs 35 crore from HoABL, located near The Sarayu. The company described it as his third investment in Ayodhya and his fourth plotted development purchase with the firm.

What Lodha has said about it

Commenting on the March 2026 deal, Lodha said Bachchan's repeated investments reflected a belief in land as something that preserves value across generations.

"At HoABL, we view land not merely as wealth but as a legacy. In Ayodhya, this legacy assumes a profound meaning, a virasat where faith and inheritance come together," he said at the time.

Ayodhya has seen sustained infrastructure investment following the consecration of the Ram Mandir in January 2024, and real estate activity in the city has picked up considerably since.

For Bachchan, what began with a missed call and a 3 am conversation has grown into a land portfolio in the city that now runs well past Rs 90 crore.

(With TOI inputs)