Wipro Chairman Azim Premji conferred highest French civilian honour
Bengaluru, Nov 28: IT czar and philanthropist Azim Premji was bestowed with the highest French civilian distinction Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour) here Wednesday.
Premji, who is the chairman of Bengaluru-headquartered IT major Wipro, received the distinction from the Ambassador of France to India Alexandre Ziegler here, Wipro said.
"The award was bestowed on Azim Premji for his outstanding contribution to developing the information technology industry in India, his economic outreach in France, and his laudable contribution to society as a philanthropist through the Azim Premji Foundation and Azim Premji University," Ziegler said.
In his acceptance speech, Premji said, "I am extremely honored by the award bestowed on me. The vibrancy of the French democracy and its diversity is an inspiration to all across the world."
The Legion d'Honneur (Legion of Honour), instituted in 1802 by Napoleon Bonaparte, is the highest civilian award given by the French Republic for outstanding service to France, regardless of the nationality of the recipients.
The President of the French Republic is the Grand Master of the Order of the Legion of Honour.
Some of the past Indian recipients of the prestigious award include renowned scientist and Bharat Ratna awardee C N R Rao, Tamil actor late Sivaji Ganesan, actor Kamal Haasan, Bengali actor Soumitra Chatterjee and superstar Shah Rukh Khan.
Wipro said its association with France spans over 15 years and the company enjoys a close relationship with several French organisations.
Nearly 65 per cent of Wipro's employees in France are locals.
France is a key market for Wipro and the company is committed to continued investments there, it added.
Premji's wife Yasmeen Premji and son Rishad Premji and Francois Gautier, Consul General of France, were present on the occasion.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
