Tata veteran Farokh N Subedar to step down in September

MUMBAI: Tata Sons chief operating officer Farokh N Subedar, who assisted the company in its battle against former chairman Cyrus Mistry, will step down from the post this September. Subedar, who is also the company secretary of Tata Sons, was given a year’s extension in 2016.

Suprakash Mukhopadhyay, vice president and company secretary at TCS, will take charge as the company secretary of Tata Sons from April. There is, however, no clarity on whether Mukhopadhyay, who is Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran’s first pick from TCS, will also hold the COO post.

Subedar, an old-hand at Tata Sons, was the first to become the investment company’s COO. Tata Sons created the post of COO for Subedar in 2010 to reward him for his contribution towards managing the company’s investments and fund-raising programmes.


Subedar would continue to be on the boards of other Tata companies such as Tata Investment Corporation and Tata Asset Management as non-executive director. At Tata Sons, the retirement age for executives is 60 years, while that for non-executive directors is 70.

For Mukhopadhyay, it will be going back to Tata Sons. He had moved to TCS in January 2008. While with Tata Sons, Mukhopadhyay was involved in TCS’ initial public offering in 2004. More recently, Mukhopadhyay has been helping Tata Sons in its fight against Mistry, which currently is played out in the courts.

Tata Sons is the promoter of the $104-billion Tata Group which includes 29 publicly listed companies. It earns its revenues mainly through dividends and royalty fees.