NEW DELHI – Two of the world’s richest men, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, took their charity roadshow to New Delhi on Thursday where they hope to coax their Indian peers to part with some of their wealth. Buffett, 80, and Gates, 55, who are close personal friends, were to meet with leading Indian businessmen at a luxury hotel in India’s capital to deliver their pitch and exchange ideas on philanthropy. The philanthropists announced last year that they would seek to persuade fellow billionaires to commit half of their wealth to good causes as part of “The Giving Pledge”. So far, 59 rich Americans have taken the pledge and the tycoons have said they want to take the campaign worldwide. “We’re not here to pressurise anybody,” said Buffett, on his first trip to India. “Everybody has his own understanding of philanthropy.”
“What the people in India do is entirely up to them.”
During a World Tuberculosis Day event in Delhi on Thursday, Gates said: “What is encouraging is that so many people have an interest in philanthropy and have decided to discuss it.” Gates, who co-founded Microsoft, and Buffett, known as the “Oracle of Omaha” for his legendary investment acumen, met Chinese billionaires on a similar charity mission to Beijing last September that they declared a success. India has 55 billionaires, according to Forbes magazine, the third-largest pool after United States and China, and two of the world’s 10 richest men are Indians. But scorching economic growth has opened a yawning divide between India’s wealthy and its teeming poor.
Local media have been cynical about the US billionaires’ chances of getting India’s wealthy to open their wallets. India’s rich “have a poor record of giving”, noted the NDTV television network. “They say they will turn up at the event to hear the wit and wisdom of the Oracle of Omaha — but may send him back with empty pockets,” it said in a website commentary. A recent study by global consultancy Bain and Co noted that “today in India, many of those with hard-earned new wealth are not eager to part with even a small amount of their money.”
The guest list for the duo’s encounter was secret but was expected to include Azim Premji, founder of software giant Wipro who last year donated $2 billion to rural education — one of the largest charitable donations in Indian history. While Indians have a long culture of giving, wealthy people mostly help household staff or give to local community and religious groups.
