The Tata Group, one of India’s largest and oldest conglomerates, is mired in internecine conflict over leadership and whether it should publicly list.
On one side is family patriarch Noel Tata, who heads Tata Trusts, the group of charities that controls two-thirds of the conglomerate’s parent company, Tata Sons Pvt. On the other is Nataranjan Chandrasekaran, Tata Sons’ chairman with no links to the founding family but a slew of powerful corporate backers. Chandra, as he’s called, has helmed the sprawling conglomerate for nearly a decade during which it moved into high-tech manufacturing like iPhones and semi-conductor chips.
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In an unusual board mutiny on Sept. 17, the directors voted to extend Chandra’s tenure by five years and decided to comply with a regulatory directive for a public listing, overruling Noel’s dissent on both the issues. The intensifying power tussle atop the $185 billion conglomerate has thrown up the central question of who really controls the group.
Surrounding Noel and Chandra is a cast of characters which has not been in the spotlight as much but they have played key roles in the conflict — and will be pivotal in how it is resolved. Here are five of those who hold considerable sway in this corporate drama.
Venu Srinivasan
The 73-year-old chairman emeritus of two-wheeler maker TVS Motor Co., Srinivasan backed Noel to succeed Ratan Tata as chairman of Tata Trusts in 2024. A year later, Noel joined fellow trustees in unanimously supporting Srinivasan’s reappointment as vice chairman under a framework intended to give trustees lifetime tenures.
That mutual backscratching arrangement broke down ahead of Tata Sons’ watershed board meeting, which thwarted Noel’s plans to exert more influence.
