Steel magnate Lord Swraj Paul, chairman of steelmakers Caparo Group, scooped the coveted Lifetime Achievement Award at the 12th annual Eastern Eye Asian Business Awards on Wednesday 19th November 2008. The event coincided with the release of 'Britain's Richest Asians' Magazine, an up-to-date audit of Asian wealth in Britain. While the financial downturn has been looming over the economy, there has been an astonishing boom within the UK Asian business community since 2007, as the combined wealth of the Top 20 richest British Asian's on the index has increased by 35%.

Lord Paul, an active member of the House of Lords, led the Asian rich list as a billionaire with an increased accumulation of wealth to £1.5 billion from last year. This was followed by the Jatania family who made their £1bn investing in unwanted fragrance and cosmetics brands such as Yardley and Vosene and rebranding and re-launching them through their company, Lornamead.

Gurmeet Khangura, Chairman of Ethnic Media Group, publisher of Eastern Eye, says: ''We are proud to celebrate 12 years of honouring the Asian men and women in the UK business market. They have not only established themselves as important contributors to the nation's economy, but their innovation and hard work have further inspired younger entrepreneurs striving to achieve the same levels of success for themselves.'

The winners of the Eastern Eye Asian Business Awards 2008 were as follows:

• Community Award: Kamel Hothi
• Young Achiever of the Year: Imran Hakim
• Entrepreneur of the Year: James Caan
• Businesswoman of the Year: Geetie Singh
• Business of the Year: Angad Paul
• Eastern Eye Lifetime Achievement Award: Lord Swraj Paul

About the Winners

Community Award: Ms Kamel Hothi, Asian Markets Director at Lloyds TSB

A child of the partition of India and Pakistan, Kamel Hothi migrated to England with her family to build a better life. Coming from a very strict upbringing Kamel has encountered and overcome many barriers both at home and at work as traditional restrictions to further education meant she had to disregard her professional ambitions. However, Kamel soon challenged the status quo and started work as a cashier with a promise to abide by her cultural ethics.

The path up the corporate ladder wasn't an easy task. Kamel started during a time when there were few ethnic minorities working for the then TSB branch and during a period when there was limited understanding of diversity issues. However she broke new ground when she became the banks first Asian bank manager and more so when she climbed the corporate ladder to Director Position at Lloyds TSB, becoming the architect behind the Asian strategy at the Bank.

After many years in the profession Kamel wanted to give other ethnic minorities a helping chance that she never had ' this soon translated in Kamel becoming one of original steering group members of Lloyds TSB banks' Ethnic minority network as well as a non executive member of the Women's network.

She has been a role model within the bank pushing the case for diversity to senior executives and mentoring many individuals and has educated over 500 colleagues from board members to Directors on cultural awareness and doing business the right way. For the past 7 years she has been one of the key driving forces behind the banks Black and Ethnic minority network for others to release their potential.

Outside of work, Kamel has chaired a Government Procurement Working Group, advising Ministers on how they can help Small Ethnic Minority businesses grow. Recently she participated in a report to support cohesion in the community led by the Foreign Office. She is a committee member of The Asian Guild and has won a number of community awards for her work in diversity and within the Asian community.

Young Achiever of the Year: Mr Imran Hakim

Young entrepreneur Imran Hakim is best known as one of the most successful individuals to gain investment on BBC2's Dragons' Den with his innovative iTeddy product. However his business experience goes far beyond the realm of television. An optometrist by profession, he runs a successful chain of independent practices in and around the Northwest. Having run his own business since he was 16, he has extensive first-hand experience of a huge range of business sectors.

Imran controls a diverse business portfolio which includes a lens laboratory, spectacle frame distribution, optical retailing, management, recruitment and most recently a toy company with the development of iTeddy. His business experience ranges from restructuring existing loss-making businesses out of administration to become successful and profitable operations - to successfully negotiating licensing arrangements with global brands including Reebok, Longines and Revlon in order to secure distribution rights within given territories.

In 2007, after securing investment on Dragons' Den, Imran worked with prolific businessmen Theo Paphitis and Peter Jones to launch the award-winning iTeddy. Billed as the Teddy Bear brand for the 21st century. This year Imran has put together a distribution deal with Vivid Imaginations UK's biggest toy company, and the product is now retailing in more than 40 countries world-wide, including every major UK toy retailer (including Tesco, Asda, Argos, Woolworths, Costco, Makro, John Lewis, Littlewoods, Harrods, Hamleys etc) with an extensive global TV campaign.

Imran has won several business awards over the years in recognition of his numerous endeavours, including: Best Newcomer to Vision Express 2005, the North West Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2006, and Fusion Entrepreneur of the Year 2007. His work growing the iTeddy brand has earned him awards for Design, Innovation and Technology 07, Toy Inventor of the Year 07 and World Toy Innovation 08, Startup Business of the year 08, IoD Northwest Young Director of the year 08, as well as a string of International product awards.

In his spare time, Imran works to encourage entrepreneurship, through speaking engagements and mentoring young entrepreneurs. He is now an active member of TIE, UKIBC, NWIDF and Bolton PCT. He has recently teamed up with fellow entrepreneur Ben Way, investing and incubating start-up companies through 'The Rainmakers'.

Entrepreneur of the Year: Mr James Caan, CEO of Hamilton Bradshaw

James Caan is CEO of private equity firm Hamilton Bradshaw and has been building and selling businesses since 1985. Having founded the Alexander Mann Group in 1985, an executive head hunting firm with a turnover of £300m and operations in 50 countries, Caan sold the company in 2002. Caan also co-founded executive head-hunting firm Humana International with his partner Doug Bugie, growing the business to over 147 offices across 30 countries from 1993-1999.

In 2001 Caan was awarded the BT Enterprise of the Year award for outstanding success in business and having already been a finalist in 2000 he was named PricewaterhouseCoopers Entrepreneur of the Year 2003. That same year, having successfully graduated from the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School, Caan also won the Entrepreneur category in the Asian Jewel Awards.

Setting up London-based Hamilton Bradshaw in 2004, the private equity company specialises in buyouts, venture capital, turnarounds and real estate investments and development opportunities in both the UK and Europe. Investing up to £10 million in each individual transaction.

In October 2007, Caan joined the panel in the fifth series of BBC Two's Dragons' Den and filmed series six transmitted this Autumn soon to be followed by with a 1 hour special 'Outside of The Den' following up on Den Investments as well as exploring both his business and personal journey.

September 2008 saw James publish his Autobiography The Real Deal - an incredible story of his remarkable life. From his childhood as a Pakistani immigrant to the phenomenal success of his first company, this book traces James's journey to both financial and personal maturity. Published by Virgin it deals with his fear at realising his goals too early, and offers a frank account of what success at 30 really means. The Real Deal brings us bang up to the present, including what his charity work in Kashmir means to him, and how he has come to completely re-evaluate what money is really worth. A married father of two daughters, Caan has homes in London, the South of France and Pakistan.

Businesswoman of the Year: Ms Geetie Singh, founder of Duke of Cambridge, the UK's first organic pub:

Some entrepreneurs make a conscious decision to run their businesses ethically, even if it means foregoing a slice of their profits. But Geetie Singh, the Managing Director and founder of The Duke of Cambridge, the UK's first organic pub, has proved you can run a thriving business without sacrificing your core values. She opened her organic and environmentally sustainable gastropub the Duke of Cambridge in 1998, and a decade on, she's still in the minority.

Having grown up in a 'very politically minded' commune where food origin and its impact on the environment was a big priority, Geetie was shocked at the lack of sustainability when she started working as a waitress at the age of 18. She was horrified by the wastefulness that she witnessed. Geetie was determined to combine her passion of pubs and food, and set up a business that could thrive without harming the environment, bringing delicious organic food to its customers, and educating them about organics, sustainable living and seasonal eating.

A decade after starting out in the industry, Geetie felt she had enough experience to open her own restaurant. Taking on partner Esther Boulton to help with the planning stage, Geetie began her £250,000 fundraising mission.

After three premises agreements falling through, and coming close to the wire with funding, the Duke of Cambridge opened and the pub broke even in its fourth month. The pub continues to profit each year, a product of Geetie's pioneering business model.

Business of the Year: Mr Angad Paul, CEO of Caparo Group

Angad Paul was the one Lord Paul turned to in late 2002 when the founder of the Caparo wanted 'youth and dynamism' in a new chief executive officer to drive forward the modest steel company he had established in Huntingdon in 1968.

Today, Caparo is a Dollar1.2bn global group specialising in the manufacture of steel, automotive and engineered products. It employs 7,500 people, including 3,500 at 45 locations in the UK and over 2,000 at 30 facilities in India (it will make parts for the Nano, Ratan Tata's Pound1,500 'people's car'). It also has operations in Spain, North America, Canada and Dubai.

Angad followed his twin elder brothers, Akash and Ambar, to Harrow and then, like his father, went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in America where he read Economics. Angad also qualified in film studies and was years later executive producer on Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch.

The Paul family are known to be close and much is done in the name of Ambika, 'the sister I never knew but who inspires us all'. She died of leukaemia in 1968, two years before Angad was born.

Caparo contributes real manufacturing jobs to the real economy. And Angad, who has to lead a hectic jet set life, has been given an awesome responsibility by his father ' nurturing and then taking the best of British engineering skills to Caparo plants all over the world.'What we are trying to do is bring international standards of delivery to India,' says Angad.

Lifetime Achievement Award: Lord Swraj Paul, Chairman of Caparo Group

In the year that Mahatma Gandhi made his epic salt march to defy Brit­ish rule in India, Swraj, which means freedom, was born. Industrialist Lord Swraj Paul, chairman of Caparo Group and a patriarch of British Asian businesses, was born in Jalandhar, India in 1931. He married Aruna Vij in 1956 and they have three sons, one daughter, and a daughter who is sadly deceased. Lord Paul was educated at Punjab University and then studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in America, from which he graduated with a masters degree in mechanical engineering. After leaving education, he joined the family busi­ness in India, the Apeejay Surrendra Group which was founded by his father.

Lord Paul came to Britain in 1966 to seek medi­cal aid for his young daughter Ambika who was seriously ill. After her death he decided to stay and work in Britain and founded Caparo. Caparo now employs some 7,000 people in six countries ' UK, USA, Canada, India, Spain and Dubai.

Lord Paul, an active member of the House of Lords, is committed to promoting social and edu­cation policies. He was appointed Chancellor of the University of Wolverhampton in 1999 and Chancellor of the University of Westminster in 2006 and has been awarded 15 honorary degrees from universities in the UK, USA, India, Europe and Russia.

He is a member of the Foreign Policy Centre Advisory Council and a member of the UK India Business Council Advisory Board. He was Co-Chairman of the India-UK Round Table 2000-2005 and sits on two House of Lords Select Committees - European Union: Internal Market, and Economic Affairs. Lord Paul was also a board member of London 2012, the London Development Agency and the Chairman of the Olympics Delivery Committee. A philanthopist by nature, Lord Paul created the Ambika Paul Memorial Gardens and Ambika Paul Children's Zoo at the London Zoo. He is also responsible for creating the Ambika P3 exhibition hall at Westminster University. He is the Chairman and Trustee of PiggyBankKids, and has been on the boards of other major charities including the Prince's Trust, RNIB, and NSPCC.