Cyrus Mistry ejected from Tata Sons board

Former Tata Sons Chairman Cyrus Mistry was ousted as a Director of the company at its Extraordinary General Meeting on Monday. With this, the Shapoorji Pallonji family, the single-largest shareholder in Tata Sons, also loses its representation on the board.

“The shareholders passed the resolution to remove Mistry with the “requisite majority”, a company statement said.

Noel voted to axe Mistry? Tata Sons directors, including Chairman-Emeritus Ratan Tata, Chairman-designate N Chandrasekaran and Non-executive Director Ajay Piramal were present. Mistry and Ratan Tata’s stepbrother, Noel Tata, were conspicuous by their absence. However, sources said that Noel Tata, who is married to Mistry’s sister, voted through proxies in favour of Mistry’s removal.

The Tata-Mistry fight will now shift to the courtrooms of the NCLT, the NCLAT and the High Courts of Mumbai and Delhi. “Now, we have to wait for the final reasoning of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal on the main case, based on which we will take a call,” Tata Sons counsel Mohan Parasaran told BusinessLine .

Parasaran was referring to the original petition filed by two of Mistry’s family-owned firms — Cyrus Investments and Sterling Investment Corporation — before the National Company Law Tribunal. It had challenged Mistry’s ouster as Chairman.