Gujarati Bizman Rejected Jinnah's Offer To Become Pakistan's 1st Finance Minister. His Son Is…
Wipro founder chairman Azim Premji turned 80 recently. A big name in business, Premji played a big role in strengthening Wipro's business interests in sectors like cooking oil, IT, BPO and R&D services organisation after his father, Mohamed Hasham Premji, passed away in 1966. But, not many know that Muhammad Ali Jinnah himself offered the post of Pakistan's Finance Minister to Mohamed Hasham Premji.
Hasham Premji belonged to a Gujarati Ismaili Muslim family. He founded a vegetable oil company called Western India Products Ltd in 1945, the same year his son Azim was born. When the partition happened in 1947, Premji and his family chose to stay in India. Reports suggest that Jinnah, the founding father of Pakistan, was keen to have Hashem as a cabinet minister and had even personally approached him on the matter.
Dinesh C Sharma mentioned this incident in his book The Long Revolution—the birth and growth of India's IT industry, explaining that Mohamed Hasham Premji had been offered the post of Pakistan's first Finance Minister. Premji, also known as the 'Rice King of Burma', had moved to Bombay with his family for trading.
How Western India Products Ltd Became Wipro
Western India Products Ltd was mainly focused on producing sunflower vanaspati oil. It shifted to making soaps and other consumer care products later. In 1966, Azim Premji dropped out of Stanford after his father's death and assumed responsibility for the business. He expanded the company, making a foray into IT and other sectors. Under his leadership, the firm changed its name to Wipro Products Ltd and then to Wipro Ltd in 1982.
Wipro is now one of India's most well-known companies. Azim Premji is listed in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with a net worth of $11.8 billion. He stepped down from leading the company in 2019 and his son Rishad became the executive chairman of the conglomerate.
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