Ratan Tata on Friday filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking to quash a company law appellate court order directing Tata Sons to rehire the chairman it had fired in 2016, saying the judgment was “wrong, erroneous and contrary to the record of the case”.
His petition is separate from the one filed by Tata Sons Ltd, the holding company of the $110 billion salt-to-software conglomerate, in the Supreme Court on Thursday that sought a stay on the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal’s December 18, 2019 order to reinstate Cyrus Mistry as the chairman.
Ratan Tata, who is chairman emeritus and a shareholder of Tata Sons, in the petition said the NCLAT judgment was wrong as it treats Tata Sons as a two-group company.
Mistry, he contended, was made the Executive Chairman of Tata Sons in a purely professional capacity and not as a representative of the Shapoorji Pallonji Group, which holds 18.4 per cent in Tata Sons.
Tata Trusts, of whom Ratan Tata had been a chairman for many years, holds 65.89 per cent of Tata Sons.
The petition said the NCLAT order wrongly suggests that “someone from the SP Group had been a director because of some entrenched right or convention”.
“This is untrue and contrary to the records and the articles of association of Tata Sons, which are undisputed and binding on the shareholders including the SP Group,” he contended.
He said Mistry’s leadership “was lacking” in “his reluctance to timely and meaningfully disassociate himself from his family business after he became the Chairman of Tata Sons and address any conflict in this regard, which was a condition precedent to his appointment as Chairman of Tata Sons”.
Mistry, he alleged, “concentrated power and authority in his own hands” and “board members were being alienated on matters relating to Tata Operating Companies where Tata Sons had huge financial exposure and the Board of Tata Sons had to contend with such decisions being cast upon it as fait accompli”.