Small shareholders demand seat at Alembic board

Corporate governance experts claim it could trigger a trend

Shareholders demanding a board seat at Alembic, the oldest pharmaceutical firm in the country, to ensure better returns could trigger a similar trend elsewhere, said proxy advisory firms and corporate governance experts.

“We are going to see small shareholders increasingly use this mechanism to voice their concerns,” said Shriram Subramanian, managing director of proxy advisory and corporate governance firm InGovern Research Services. 

“Such things happen quite often in the US; this is something new in India,” he added. 

Another proxy advisor firm, Institutional Investor Advisory Services (IIAS), said this case will define the equation between companies and their shareholders,