Summary Azim Premji has given $2.3b to an charity, the biggest donation in country's recent history.
NEW DELHI (AFP) - It is his second major recent donation after giving almost $2 billion to the charity in 2010, and came shortly after he joined the Giving Pledge club set up by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and billionaire investor Warren Buffet.
In Saturday s donation, the chairman of software firm Wipro transferred shares worth $2.3 billion from the company to a trust which controls the education charity Azim Premji Foundation, a company statement said.
The billionaire, who inherited a cooking oil company and transformed it into India s third-biggest outsourcing services firm, said the trust will use the funds to scale up the foundation s activities "significantly".
The charity seeks to boost the quality of India s overstretched education system by improving teacher quality and setting up model schools.
The Business Standard newspaper and other media reported it was the biggest one-off donation to charity in India in modern times.
The media-shy tycoon is India s third wealthiest individual with a net worth of some $16 billion, according to a 2012 Forbes rich list.
Premji has long promoted education as a way to tackle India s deep poverty and told a recent World Economic Forum in Davos that "education is perhaps the most powerful enabler of human life and equity".
A few days ago, he became the first Indian to join the Giving Pledge club, which encourages the world s wealthiest to donate at least half their fortunes to charity.
Those who are "privileged to have wealth should contribute significantly to try and create a better world for the millions who are far less privileged," Premji said when joining the club.
