Azim Premji, One Of India's Biggest Billionaire Philanthropists, Even Inspires Bill Gates
Since Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates set up the Giving Pledge almost 10 years ago, he¡¯s given away a huge portion of his wealth to charity. And now, one of the richest Indians in the world has joined him in donations.
When Azim Premji took over from his father, as chairman of Wipro, in 1966, he was just 21. Over 50 years later, the iconic Indian CEO is now all set to retire, after a long career that saw both him and the company changed forever.
Wipro had originally been set up to manufacture vegetable and refined oils back in 1945. But in the 1970s, Premji looked at the growing computing boom across the ocean, and realised there was an untapped market in India. So over the next decade or so, he pivoted the company to the IT industry, aside from other ventures into heavy industry machinery and other consumer products
Today, Wipro is an IT giant known across the world. And in a letter announcing his retirement next month, Premji credited the thousands of Wipro employees helped build the company into a successful, ethical and socially-responsible organisation.
"The first thing is his intensity," Dilip Ranjekar, CEO of the charitable Azim Premji Foundation, told ET. "He has a never-say-die attitude. I have never seen anything like that. The second thing is his professionalism. He is a proprietor, yet extremely professional. He ran the organisation on merit and facts."
"The other thing is his extremely middle-class values. There is no flashiness, no flaunting. He knows that what he does or doesn't do affects the organisation. He always ran a tight ship at Wipro."
Premji has also, through his years as chairman of Wipro, given away large sums to charity. He and his family control 74 percent of the company's shares. And recently, he announced that all earnings from approximately 34 percent of shares - worth about Rs 52,750 crore - would be transferred to the Azim Premji Foundation. He's made charitable donations before too, bringing his total commitment to Rs 1.45 lakh crore.
That makes it one of the five largest private donations in the world and the biggest in Asia.
I¡¯m inspired by Azim Premji¡¯s continued commitment to philanthropy. His latest contribution will make a tremendous impact. https://t.co/IOTiHxtivw
¡ª Bill Gates (@BillGates) March 24, 2019
In response, Gates tweeted about the news, saying, "I'm inspired by Azim Premji's continued commitment to philanthropy."
The Azim Premji Foundation was also launched around the same time as the Giving Pledge, and has contributed immensely to furthering education in India. Specifically, it provides aid to poorly-funded government schools in the country.
