Azim Premji pledges Rs 12500cr to Gates, Buffett charity

Azim Premji has pledged a substantial portion of his wealth to a trust through the Azim Premji Foundation. CNBC-TV18's Shreya Roy reports.

Earlier this week Azim Premji had become the first Indian entrepreneur to signup for the Giving Pledge which is the charity initiative by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. At that point he mentioned that he was looking forward to giving away more of his personal wealth towards philanthropic pursuits and today he did that by pledging shares worth Rs 12500 crore into an irrevocable trust.

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The Rs 12500 crore worth of shares represents around 295.5 million shares of Wipro or 12 percent of the company’s total shares and this brings the trust share holding in Wipro to about 19.93 percent. The trust is going to utilise the endowment to fund initiatives in social not for profit activities.
Azim Premji had already donated close to USD 2 billion of his personal wealth through the Azim Premji foundation which has gone into pursuits in rural development and education.