Azim Premji at 80: A billionaire on his own terms

Azim Hasham Premji turned 80 yesterday. But for a one-line tweet and picture from son Rishad Premji, present chairman of Wipro, ‘Happy 80th birthday to this guy”, there were no public celebrations, no birthday messages circulated, and no press release from Wipro. So typical of the man who has spent a lifetime resisting the spotlight. An extremely private person, he was embarrassed when all media gaze came on him when he was briefly world’s richest Indian at $39.5 billion. “I feel like a zoo animal these days.”

The first Indian to sign the Giving Pledge in 2013, started by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, this uncommon billionaire’s acts of giving too have always been with minimal fuss. Working across 263 teacher learning centres and 59 field offices, Azim Premji Foundation has reached more than eight million children and endowed $29 billion. In 2023-24 alone, the foundation disbursed $109 million in grants to nearly 940 organisations across education, health, and public interest. Recognising his extraordinary efforts to improve public education in India for the past 25 years, the TIME magazine named him among its Titans in TIME 100 Philanthropy 2025 list that was released in May.

But before the quiet giving away of billions, there was the business story — one that began with many expecting him to fail. In 1966, 21-year-old Azim Premji was studying engineering at Stanford when the news of his father’s sudden death came. He flew back to India and took charge of the family’s cooking oil business, Western India Vegetable Products Ltd. The Maharashtra-based company was weighed down by debt then. Most thought he was too young and inexperienced. He proved them wrong. First stepping into soaps, then shoes, then into electronics, he renamed the company WIPRO (Western India Palm Refined Oils) Limited in 1977. A year later, when the Indian government forced IBM to exit the country for refusing to cede control to Indian ownership, Premji sensed an opening. At a time when few in India even understood what a computer was, he moved Wipro into information technology. He hired India’s best engineers and management graduates, handpicking them from top B-schools. WIPRO eventually became the first Indian IT company to list on the New York Stock Exchange. Along with Infosys and TCS, the company became part of the original triumvirate that put India on the global IT map.

And yet, this ‘Czar’ of the Indian IT industry remained an oddball, not conforming to any preconceived notions about how billionaires should be. Often called Lalaji by some old timers, stories of his simplicity, discipline and sharp acumen abound. He would carry his famous yellow pad to meetings and take meticulous notes. He had a deep disregard of waste. He insisted that both sides of a sheet of paper must be used for photocopying. He would go around the office switching off the lights and fans after everyone had left. For any personal calls he made at work, he insisted on paying from his pocket, setting a precedent for others. For years, he drove a modest Fiat before upgrading to an Innova — a change reluctantly made. Unlike most billionaires, he doesn’t travel first class. He believes in buying ‘Made in India’ products.

Businesswoman Kiran Mazumdar Shaw once recalled how Premji donned a hat and moustache to shop anonymously for artefacts, fearing sellers would overcharge him.

Major family events, like his own wedding or his son Rishad’s, too were kept deliberately low-key, with barely 100 guests. For Premji, ethics and values were important than any degrees a person has. Before anyone is hired to report directly to him, both Premji and his wife Yasmeen would meet not just the executive, but their spouse as well — to assess values, not just resumes.

Micromanaging everything, Premji would get into the nitty-gritty of every tiny issue. A plaque on his desk read: ‘The buck stops here.’ And it did. He rarely took a vacation or went sightseeing. Over the years, he has instituted best practices that are today the byword for ethics and corporate behaviour.

One cannot help but agree with Dr Devi Shetty, Chairman of Narayan Health, when he says, “Azim Premji is not just a name. He denotes a vision, a journey, a saga of tenacity and incorrigible determination. It redefines philanthropy and connotes the spirit of trusteeship.”

His lecture addressing a group of business school students sums the way this business tycoon handled the many successes as well as failures in his more than five-decade-old career: “It is impossible to generate a few good ideas without a lot of bad ideas. Failure should be forgiven and forgotten completely.”