Smart People

 Rajnish Narula, 43, understands that he has a lot of answering to do in his new job. That's perhaps why he decided to meet a journalist on the very day he joined Alliance Capital as its chief executive.

The mutual fund has been headless for more than six months after Nikhil Johri quit as CEO following the controversy relating to an aborted bid to sell the AMC to HDFC Mutual Fund.

And shortly after that Alliance itself came under a cloud when its CIO was put in the dock by Sebi for alleged insider trading in Digital GlobalSoft.

Narula, who took the hot seat on September 8, believes Alliance Capital still has a 'fantastic brand name' and the damage that one individual can cause to the organisation is limited.

"Samir Arora was an important part of the organisation till the time he was there. We are looking for a replacement for Samir Arora," says Narula.

Narula comes with about 21 years of experience from Standard Chartered Bank. His most recent position at the bank was as head, investment services, priority banking, non-resident business and capital markets.

An MBA from Iona college, New York, Narula will have a lot of fire-fighting to do. He has to deal with litigation, loss of investor confidence with the loss of a star fund manager, and anxious staff.

But even with all these uncertainties, Narula is planning expansion to show the world that Alliance Capital is indeed committed to India. Expansion of the fund's distribution network to five new cities is on the cards.

"Mutual fund companies in India have grown on the back of good distribution chains and credible fund performances. We will ensure both these factors work well for us as well," says Narula. There's nothing like strong performance to quieten the critics.

With the equity markets on fire, one would think debt aficionados should be piping down. Not Shalini Tibrewala, fund manager for the award-winning JM High Liquidity Fund.

"The debt market is poised for a major bull run. We anticipate cuts in the bank rate and CRR along with a softening of the refinancing rate," she says.

 Tibrewala, 31, recently won Crisil's Best Fund Award, 2003, in the liquid schemes category. Not an easy thing to accomplish, since competition in the category is tough and the margins of outperformance tend to be small - even microscopic. So how does she do it? In one word, it's consistency.

Says Tibrewala: "Consistency in delivering the goods - be it in results, investment philosophy or growth - has been the mainstay of our performance. JM High Liquidity Fund has been consistently performing in the Crisil composite performance ratings (CPR). It has been rated at CPR-1 for the last three quarters."

A graduate in commerce from Sydenham College in Mumbai, Shalini went on to complete her company secretaryship from the Institute of Company Secretaries of India and is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.

Having joined JM Mutual Fund in March, 1997, Shalini has been responsible for managing the JM High Liquidity Fund, which has a corpus of about Rs 1,550 crore, since its inception.

After a hard day spent in juggling portfolios, Shalini unwinds by playing the sitar. She also has a keen interest in bonsai, astrology, photography, cooking and travelling. Her personal portfolio of interest is obviously as diversified as the fund she manages.