Boston, MA, United States (AHN) – The prestigious Tata Group of Companies has paid the equally prestigious Harvard Business School (HBS) an astounding donation worth $50 million, the largest international donation received by the School since its establishment 102 years ago.
The contribution will be used to build a new academic-cum-residential building on the campus, which will be called Tata Hall. It is expected to be ready for use by 2013.
The donation was from the Tata Companies, as well as its philanthropic arms the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust and the Tata Education and Development Trust.
The contribution comes just days after Anand Mahindra, vice chairman of the Mahindra and Mahindra Group, donated $10 million to the Humanities Center at Harvard, which is also Mahindra’s alma mater.
For Ratan Tata too, Chairman of the Tata Sons, this was a way to pay homage to his alma mater, as he has studied at Harvard’s Advanced Management Programme, way back in 1975. For his later achievements in life, Tata was also honored with the Alumni Achievement Award in 1995.
Tata called the donation a “privilege,” adding that it was a pleasure to “give back to Harvard a little bit of what it gave to me.”
He said, “The Harvard Business School is the preeminent place to be exposed to the world’s best thinking on management and leadership and we are pleased that this gift will support the School’s educational mission to mold the next generation of global business leaders.”
Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust said that it was a “historic gift.” The mayor of Boston, Thomas M. Menino, said that the gift would create jobs in Boston and the executives would leave HBS as “ambassadors of our truly world-class city.”
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