MUMBAI: The boardroom brawl between Tata Sons and its recently ousted chairman Cyrus Mistry rose another notch on Tuesday after the board of yet another Tata firm removed him from the post of company Chairman.
In a statement filed with the stock exchanges, Tata Global Beverages Ltd (TGBL) said that seven out of ten directors on its board had voted to remove Mistry from his post and replace him with Harish Bhat.
Out of the six independent directors on the board of TGBL, two — Darius Pandole and Analjit Singh — voted against the resolution moved for Mistry’s ouster. One, Ireena Vittal is believed to have abstained. Harish Bhat, the new chairman, is reportedly a confident of Ratan Tata who is now back at the helm of Tata Sons.
TGBL is the second Tata firm after Tata Consultancy Services to have removed Mistry from the chairmanship. However, Mistry still remains at the helm of nearly all other listed Tata firms including IHCL, Tata Steel and Tata Chemicals. Independent directors at Tata Steel and IHCL had released statements backing Mistry after their respective board meetings last week.
However, some directors at Tata Steel shot down a similar statement and the Tata Motors board, on Monday, had shied away from naming Mistry in their statement supporting the company’s management.
The developments in the boardrooms of individual Tata firms has brought to light a deep divide within the Group, with supporters of Mistry (spearheaded by Bombay Dyeing and Brittania Industries chairman Nusli Wadia) pushing for statements of support, with others shooting down the proposals.
In a statement after the removal, Mistry’s office said that the move was illegal. “When the proposal to remove Mr Mistry was sought to be moved, it was ruled out by the Chairman since it was not on the agenda. The meeting was conducted by Mr Mistry as Chairman and was concluded,” it said.
While Tata Sons is trying to remove Mistry from both the boards and the chairmanship in the group firms, TGBL and TCS are the only ones in which they have succeeded. Tata Sons holds a 73.26 per cent stake in TCS. It’s stakeholdings in other group firms are significantly less.