The addition of 25 new faces salvaged the Edelgive Hurun India Philanthropy List 2023 as the overall list of 119 would have fallen below the last year’s level of 108.

With a donation of ₹47 crore, K Dinesh 69, co-founder of Infosys, was the most generous new entrant in the Edelgive Hurun Philanthropy list this year,followed by Rameshchandra T Jain and Family of Bhilosa Industries, and Narendrakumar Baldota and Family of MSPL donating 17 crore and 13 crore each.

Vembu Radha and Vembu Sekar of Zoho Corporation donated ₹13 crore and ₹10 crore each, followed by Kishore Kumar Jain of Khazana Jewellery and Shivkishan Moolchand Agarwal’s contribution of ₹10 crore each.

Interestingly, the donation made by Mukesh Ambani was down 8 per cent in the year ended March at ₹376 crore, while Shiv Nadar and Azim Premji topped the list by giving away ₹2,042 crore and ₹1,774 crore for Arts and Culture and Education.

Among Infosys founders, Nandan Nilekani and his wife Rohini Nilekani gave away ₹189 crore and ₹170 crore for ecosystem building. Kris Gopalakrishnan of Infosys, who donated ₹93 crore for education, was ranked among top-10.

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Only professional

With a donation of ₹150 crore, former Chairman of L&T, AM Naik, 81, was the only professional to figure in the top-10 donors list, while Susmita and Subroto Bagchi of Mindtree gave away ₹110 core. MA Yusuff Ali of Lulu Group made a donation of ₹107 crore in FY’23.

Though the donation made by 119 philanthropists increased 50 per cent to ₹8,445 crore in FY’23, compared to ₹5,623 crore in the previous year, it has fallen sharply from ₹14,755 crore logged in FY’21.

Incidentally, the 360 ONE Wealth Hurun India Rich List 2023 released in October found the cumulative wealth of 1,319 individuals had surged to ₹109 lakh crore, surpassing the combined GDP of Singapore, UAE, and Saudi Arabia. 

Anas Rahman Junaid, Managing Director and Chief Researcher, Hurun India said the number of donors contributing over ₹100 crore has surged from 2 to 14 and those donating over ₹50 crore has risen from 5 to 24 this year.

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Given India’s potential for wealth creation and assuming a continued commitment to philanthropy by billionaires, these figures to potentially double over the next 5 years.

Cumulative personal donations have increased by 60 per cent to reach ₹4,958 crore, constituting 70 per cent of the total donations in the list, he said.

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