Billionaire Mukesh Ambani‘s three children as directors of Reliance Industries Ltd will be paid only a fee for attending board and committee meetings, the company said in a resolution seeking shareholder nod for their appointment on its board.
While Ambani, 66, drew nil salary from the company since the 2020-21 fiscal year, other executive directors including his cousins Nikhil and Hital are paid a salary, perquisites, allowances and commission. His three children – twins Akash and Isha (both 31) and Anant (28 years) – will get only a sitting fee and a commission on the profit earned by the firm.
The terms of the appointment of the three are the same as the ones on which Ambani’s wife Nita was appointed to the company board in 2014. She earned a sitting fee of ?6 lakh and a commission of ?2 crore in the 2022-23 fiscal year (April 2022 to March 2023), according to the company’s latest annual report. Ambani, 66, had at the company’s annual shareholders meeting last month announced that his three children Akash, Isha and Anant would be inducted into Reliance’s board of directors (BoD).
He also stated that he would continue to be the chairman and CEO of the company for five more years, with a focus on grooming and empowering its ‘next-gen’ leaders.
Reliance has now sent out a postal ballot to shareholders seeking a nod for their appointment as board of directors of the company.
“They shall be paid remuneration by way of fee for attending meetings of the Board or Committees thereof or for any other meetings as may be decided by the Board, reimbursement of expenses for participating in the Board and other meetings and profit-related commission,” the notice said.
Reliance has five broad verticals – the oil-to-chemical (O2C) business that houses the world’s largest single-location refining complex and petrochemical plants, telecom and digital business, retail (both physical and online), new energy, and recently launched financial services.
Ambani first talked of a succession plan at the oil-to-telecom conglomerate in 2022, where he announced that each of his three children would head various divisions of the company (Akash to head telecom, Isha to head retail, and Anant to head new energy). He did not divulge the succession plan for Reliance’s mainstay oil-to-chemicals or O2C business division.
Reliance shareholders at the annual general meeting (AGM) last month gave a nod to Ambani getting another five-year term till 2029 as the head of India‘s most valuable company. And just like the past three years, he has opted to draw nil salary during this period. Source: PTI