It's Ambanis all the way in the Indian corporate world in terms of pay package or dividend earnings.
With a package of over Rs 52 crore in 2008-09, younger brother Anil has topped the list of executives in terms of compensation, while elder Mukesh has emerged as the country's highest dividend earner at Rs 930 crore, as per rankings compiled by Business India magazine.
In the top-five of compensation chart, Anil is followed by Kalanithi Maran and Kaveri Maran of Sun TV with packages of Rs 37.08 crore each, Madras Cements' P R R Rajha (Rs 28.7 crore) and Jindal Steel & Power's Naveen Jindal (Rs 28.27 crore), the magazine said in a statement today.
It is the first time that Mukesh does not figure among top-10 executives in terms of compensation package ever since the magazine started compiling the annual list in 2002.
Mukesh has been ranked at 19th position with a package of Rs 15 crore, owing to his voluntary salary cut of 66 per cent announced a few weeks ago.
The magazine noted that Anil has topped the chart "thanks to the Rs 52 crore he collected in 2008-09 as commissions for the previous year". But, he did not take any salary or commissions for 2008-09 from his five listed group companies.
Business India said that the salary figures could appear huge, but "they are almost pocket change compared to what some of these owner-executives could potential earn and to what they pocket as (tax-free) dividends."
In terms of dividend payouts, second-ranked Azim Premji got Rs 465 crore, which is nearly half the amount for Mukesh, the magazine noted.
HCL's Shiv Nadar is ranked third (Rs 320 crore), followed by Anil Ambani (Rs 256 crore), Kumar Birla (Rs 202 crore), Sun Pharma's Dilip Shanghabi (Rs 181 crore), Sun TV's Kalanithi Maran (Rs 76 crore) and Cipla's Y K Hamied (Rs 61 crore) in the dividend chart.
The magazine said that last year's financial crisis hit senior executives as many companies went into austerity drives and cut the annual compensation of many of their executives.
"But many leading executives like Baba Kalyani of Bharat Forge, Onkar Kanwar of Apollo TAyres, Sajjan Jindal of JSW and not to mention Mukesh Ambani took voluntary pay cuts in either salary or commissions and performance bonuses," it added.
For the first time since liberalisation, the salary hikes were in single digits and performance bonuses were also smaller and various studies pointed out at top leaders being the worst affected by the meltdown, the publication noted.
"The slowdown has in fact resulted in a change being introduced in the salaries at the managerial levels ...But executive compensation in India is always a thorny issue, with many companies having the C-level positions occupied by owner- managers," it added.
The magazine said that 64 of the 100 top paid executives are either the controlling shareholders of members of the family that started the companies.
