Minority shareholders can remain invested in Wipro

BENGALURU/MUMBAI: It was a watershed moment in Indian stock market history when Wipro Enterprises' chairman Azim Premji on Tuesday allowed minority shareholders to remain invested in the company despite a large majority of its shareholders passing a resolution to buy out those shares under Section 100 of the Companies Act. The section is used to force minority shareholders to exit a company. Wipro Enterprises includes the non-IT businesses of Wipro and was hived off into a separate unlisted company in 2013.

TOI had reported last week that seven families, who collectively own 55 lakh shares or about a third of the minority holdings in Wipro Enterprises, had written to Premji to drop the decision to buy them out. Minority shareholders own about 1.61 crore shares, or around 3.4%.

At the company's extraordinary general meeting in Bangalore on Tuesday, Premji assured shareholders that those who wished to remain invested could do so with court nod.

About 10 families, each of which hold over 1 lakh shares of Wipro Enterprises, said they wanted to stay invested. "This company has a good future in the long term...it could emerge as another homegrown FMCG major," said Janak Mathuradas, a Mumbai-based investor who has a substantial holding in the company. "Unlike any other company which went for a Section 100 resolution to force minority shareholders to exit, this company has given an option to us to stay invested," he said.