Tata feud: Venu Srinivasan, Vijay Singh hit back at Khambata, accuse him of ignoring governance failures

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Published - November 13, 2026 11:10 pm IST - New Delhi

the two trustees challenged Darius Khambata’s arguments on the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) regulatory position, the proposed listing of Tata Sons, the fiduciary responsibilities of Trust nominees, and the circumstances surrounding the reappointment of Chairman N.

Chandrasekaran. | Photo Credit: The Hindu

Tata Trusts Vice-Chairmen Venu Srinivasan and Vijay Singh have launched a strong rebuttal to fellow trustee Darius Khambata’s criticism of the Tata Sons board’s September 17, 2026 decisions, accusing him of presenting an incomplete account of the dispute.

They have questioned whether his opposition to listing the group holding company is driven by the interests of the Tata institutions or by a desire to keep control in the hands of the Trusts’ present leadership.

In a five-page letter dated November 11, 2026, the two trustees challenged Mr.

Khambata’s arguments on the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) regulatory position, the proposed listing of Tata Sons, the fiduciary responsibilities of Trust nominees, and the circumstances surrounding the reappointment of Chairman N.

Chandrasekaran.

They also questioned his account of the events leading to the September board meeting, asking why he had not objected when an earlier unanimous decision to renew Mr.

Chandrasekaran’s tenure was allowed to remain unresolved for seven months.

The unusually direct exchange exposes the depth of divisions within the Tata Trusts, which collectively hold about 66% of Tata Sons, the holding company of the $277 billion conglomerate.

At stake is not merely whether Tata Sons should remain privately held, but also the balance of authority between its controlling charitable shareholders and the company’s board.

Trusts Chairman Noel Tata and Mr.

Khambata have opposed Mr.

Chandrasekaran’s reappointment for another five-year term and resisted listing Tata Sons, arguing that a public listing could undermine the distinctive governance structure of the Tata Group and the Trusts’ ability to safeguard its long-term interests.

Mr.

Srinivasan and Mr.

Singh, however, have backed the board’s decision to reappoint Mr.

Chandrasekaran, and argued that the company must respect regulatory requirements, including the RBI’s listing framework.

On the central question of listing, the two rejected Mr.

Khambata’s contention that Tata Sons’ engagement with the RBI had been neither meaningful nor successful.

They said discussions with the regulator began in 2023, leading to the repayment of debt and an application for deregistration in March 2024, and continued thereafter.

Trustees had been kept informed throughout, and none had questioned the adequacy of the engagement at the time, they said.

The RBI’s decision after a two-year review, that Tata Sons must continue to comply with the regulatory framework for upper-layer non-banking financial companies (NBFCs), could not be attributed to inadequate advocacy, they argued.

“If, by ‘meaningful’ advocacy, you mean advocacy that secures preferential treatment or circumvents the applicable rules, then that would not be consistent with the Tata model you seek to uphold,” they wrote.

The RBI rejected Tata Sons’ application to surrender its NBFC registration in September 2026, effectively closing the route the company had pursued to avoid the listing requirement.

The holding company had repaid more than ₹21,000 crore in debt before seeking deregistration in March 2024.

The two trustees disputed Mr.

Khambata’s assertion that listing Tata Sons would pose an existential threat to the charitable Trusts or the Tata model.