In a fresh attack on its former Chairman Cyrus Mistry, Tata Sons today issued a fresh letter criticising him and highlighting his various failures.
In it’s letter, Tata Sons, the holding company for all Tata Group companies painted a bleak picture of Mistry’s tenure.
It said :
- Mistry was Executive Vice Chairman (for one year) and Executive Chairman for nearly four years now – a period long enough to show results.
- However, dividends continuously declined from ₹1,000 crores in 2012-13 to ₹780 crores in 2015-16 while expenses increased .
- It said that Mistry had made many suggestions before his appointment, but after four years, it was “unfortunate that hardly any of his major views on the management structure were implemented.”
- It said that the existing structure of the group which had stood the test of a long period of nearly 100 years by the visionary founders and generations of Tatas seem to have been consciously dismantled “so that now the operating companies are drifting farther away from the promoter company and their major shareholder (except for periodic presentations) through systematically reducing the effective control and influence of the promoter.”
- They said they now have an “unacceptable new structure where the Chairman alone is the only common director across several companies and this situation could not be allowed to go on. In addition, there were some significant issues of conflict of interest in relation to the Shapoorji Pallonji Group which he did not fully address.”
- They also accused Mistry “of constantly using the strong public relations network of Tata to emphasize the supposedly good work being done by and under the new leadership and particularly and repeatedly highlighting the major problem areas in the group inherited by him from the previous Chairman, to account for any perceived lack of his performance.”
- They accused him of using “text-bookish directives and objectives, e.g. ‘growth with profits’, ‘target to be among the top 25 groups in the world’ by market capitalization, ‘cater to the lives of many millions’ and other such nice-sounding phrases with no indications on how these ambitious targets are to be achieved.”
- They said despite four years of full-time involvement and executive authority, “everyone continued to be told how these ‘legacy’ problem areas are a major drag on Mr. Mistry’s otherwise good performance. How many more years would we be told this same story?”
- The letter noted the three major problem companies are Tata Steel Europe, Tata Teleservices/Docomo and the Indian operations of Tata Motors. However, it noted that “even after four years, there is no noticeable improvement in the operations of these companies and in fact they have got worse as shown by continuing huge losses, increasing high debt levels and declining share in their respective markets.”
- The letter accused Mistry of not giving Ratan Tata credit for TCS and Jaguar Land Rover (JLR).
- It also accused Tata under Mistry of being “intolerant to critical reports” and pointed to the fact that even an Economist report about the Tata group was “vociferously refuted”.
- The letter said Mistry’s “attitude does not befit an old and venerable house like Tatas known for their fair play and transparency.”
- The letter said that “many practical suggestions made to Mr. Mistry for the benefit of Tata Sons vis-à-vis some of its major investments have often been ignored.”
- The letter said that Mistry was expected to “gracefully” resign from the board of all Tata group companies after being sacked as Chairman but hasn’t done so. This it claimed “demonstrates his absolute disregard of longstanding Tata traditions, values and ethos.”
- It also claimed that Mistry had the ulterior motive of trying to gain control of the Indian Hotels Co. Ltd. (IHCL) board.
- The letter said, “In hindsight, the trust reposed by Tata Sons in Mr. Mistry by appointing him as the Chairman four years ago has been betrayed by his desire to seek to control main operating companies of the Tata group to the exclusion of Tata Sons and other Tata representatives. “
- It said that Mistry had a clever strategy to take control of Tata companies and it was “unfortunate that Tata Sons, acting in good faith, did not anticipate such devious moves by Mr. Mistry and thereby did not inform the other Directors of the operating companies about its dissatisfaction with Mr. Mistry at the level of Tata Sons. However, we will now do whatever is required to deal with this situation.”
Here’s the full text of the letter: