ITC boss Deveshwar stresses corporate governance

BANGALORE: ITC chairman Yogi Deveshwar says that Indian financial statements need to also focus on issues relating to long-term sustainability like quality of leadership, vitality of human resources and brand equity.

Speaking at the CII Governance Series conference, Mr Deveshwar noted that the corner-stone of corporate governance was in ensuring that shareholder resources were used by the board(management) in their capacity as trustees to create long-term value.

“Corporate governance can’t be done by simply trying to follow concepts or principles notably those enunciated in the West. In India too we have regulations and we have to develop corporate governance practices that are relavant to the Indian environment,” he noted.

He said that merely espousing adherence to corporate governance principles was not sufficient and the true value quotient of the board of directors of a company came to the fore at times of emergency/crisis.

Specifically referring to ITC, Mr Deveshwar said that the company had initiated socially relavant projects like afforestation and re-generation of water bodies. “These projects communicate our concern about society to the consumers who feel mobilised which in turn leads to their participation by purchasing our products and help us to improve our market share,” he noted.

Speaking at the inauguration of the conference, Mr M Lakshminarayan, chairman of CII’s southern region noted that corporate governance was extremely important as the great Indian economic revolution unfolds. “The debate has now shifted focus from mandatory compliance to self-regulation and voluntary compliance initiatives,” he added.