Executive take-homes touched a new peak, fuelled by companies’ hunt for star talent.
After a one-year lull, India Inc turned on the rewards tap big time in financial year 2010 when corporate profits were back on track (aggregate net profit went up 27 per cent in 2009-10 compared to a16 per cent decline in the previous year).
So it was no surprise when surveys done by leading headhunters projected a 10 per cent-plus salary incease in FY 2010, well above China and amongst the highest in the world. But the actual increase beat projections by a long margin as the economy moved to top gear and many companies went for mid-year pay reviews. Attrition was also back. So India was right on top of a manpower survey of the best countries for new jobs.
As demand for talent zoomed, the CEOs also raked in big money, which is evident from the addition of 111 crorepati CEOs in FY 2010, taking their total number to 893.
At the top of the heap was Naveen Jindal, executive vice chairman & managing director of Jindal Steel & Power. He got a salary of Rs 69.76 crore — Rs 8.69 crore salary and Rs 61.07 crore perquisites and benefits. This was an over three-fold increase from Rs 20.36 crore Jindal earned in 2008-09.
In a way, it’s all in the family. If Sun TV owner Kalanithi Maran and his wife Kavery — joint managing director, occupied the number two slot with gross salary of Rs 37.08 crore each, Hero Group’s Pawan Munjal and his father Brij Mohan Lall Munjal was in the fourth and fifth spot respectively. Pawan took home Rs 30.88 crore and Brij Mohan Lall, who is the chairman and Founder of the Hero Group, got Rs 30.64 crore.
Reliance Industries chief Mukesh Ambani capped his salary for the second straight year at Rs 15 crore, less than half of what he is eligible to draw. But all the existing executive directors of the company, including Hital R Meswani and Nikhil R Meswani, saw their pay packages increase to Rs 11.14 crore each — up from Rs 10.93 crore in the previous year.
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Anil Ambani, chairman and managing director of Reliance Communications, and Gautam S Adani and Rajesh S Adani, the promoters of Adani Enterprises were among the top-paid executives of listed firms who either took a pay cut or did not hike their salaries during the year.
The creamy layer — executive directors and above — rewarded themselves with a big hike in pay packet in 2009-10. Overall, the salaries & wages of 106 executives more than doubled, and as many as 98 executives saw an increase of over 50 per cent.
The pay packets for promoters include commission on net profit while for professional CEOs, it is cost to company including salaries, wages & bonus, contribution to funds, staff welfare expenses, gratuity paid and other employee costs. However, this does not include allotment of shares through employee stock options schemes.
The total remuneration of the directors of the private corporate sector increased around 9 per cent in 2010 to Rs 3,493 crore compared to 20.8 per cent in 2009, courtesy salary hike in the information and technology sector to retain talents. The 1,125 CEOs were paid a gross salary of Rs 2,965 crore at an average of Rs 2.63 crore.
The pharmaceutical sector saw the maximum number of crorepati executives. As many as 68 crorepati CEO/director /managers are from this sector, followed by 55 from capital goods, 48 from information technology, 39 from steel, 36 from textiles, 31 from realty, 27 from cement, 26 from construction, 24 from chemicals and 23 each from auto ancillaries and financial services.