Mistry’s Letter Has Profound Hidden Meaning for India’s Minorities

Although Cyrus Mistry’s significant statement that he is not interested in “the executive chairmanship of Tata Sons, or directorship of TCS, Tata Teleservices or Tata Industries”, pertains to the internal matters of the Tata Group, in its entirety it mirrors the situation in the nation and provides a path that can be followed.

If one replaces Tata Group with India, and Ratan Tata with the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah duopoly, and if one swaps ‘stakeholders’ with citizens, besides striking out the word ‘corporate’ from corporate governance and corporate democracy, Mistry’s words will appear to be those of this government's critics.

Significantly, the deposed chairman of Tata Sons who forsook what was granted to him by NCLAT, has voiced the sentiment of the minority shareholders and this is no different from the minority—religious and among the intelligentsia—in this country. Mistry claimed that he was speaking “in the interests of the Tata Group, whose interests are far more important than the interests of any individual.”

Likewise, when today’s minority in the country speak up, be it on pincer-like legislations and executive actions such as CAA or NRIC, the situation in Jammu and Kashmir, against the amendment to UAPA, or Sunday’s brutal and unprecedented assault on faculty members and students of JNU, they are not protesting for just themselves. Rather, they are risking themselves and taking a public stance to safeguard this nation’s statement of belief, the Constitution and the ethos on which it was founded.

The majority always questions the fairness of judicial or quasi-judicial institutions whenever it quashes their blatant efforts to subvert the rights of the minority groups. Likewise, Mistry pointed out that when Ratan Tata and others questioned the NCLAT judgment ahead of an important hearing in the Supreme Court, they are professing an “interpretation of corporate democracy as being one of brute majoritarianism with no rights for minority stakeholders.”

Mistry may have been talking about the group which is dear to him, but his statement can be read to every Indian too. The highest of this land, from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to his lowest party minions in neighbourhoods, their understanding of democracy and democratic practices is no different from those believing in the principle of majoritarianism where minority groups would have no rights. And if anyone seeks those or articulates opposition, they would be labelled ‘traitors’ or ‘anti-national’ just as the dominant group within Tata claims that the Mistry group brought disrepute to the group.

Mistry has argued against minority groups rushing in to regain the power and privileges which they once had (when they were appeased!). Instead of accepting token positions, they should instead work towards pressurising the majority into accepting “highest standards” of “governance and transparency”.

Instead of settling for small reliefs offered by the judiciary, the objective must be to regain rights enshrined in the Constitution and securing the position of equal partners in the process of nation-building. As Mistry argued, the long-term strategy of minorities should be to “vigorously pursue all options to protect our rights as a minority shareholder.”

Mistry was right in stating that the legal dispute within the corporate giant is “whether the oppressive actions of a majority that stifles minority shareholders is beyond reproach and outside judicial oversight.”

The Indian judiciary has given the minority ample reasons in recent times to start believing that tyrannical deeds of the majority are now becoming beyond judicial reprimand and from hereon, courts are likely to turn a blind eye if the rights and lives of minorities are quashed.

Although speaking for Tata Group, Mistry words about a bygone era are true for the country too, when the “founding fathers of the Tata Group had laid a strong ethical foundation that cared for all stakeholders.”

The relationship between the company and the minority, even for the nation, was “built on common agreement and mutual faith”. And, previous “Tata leaders (read premiers in the national context) worked together with the minority partner to create value for all stakeholders.”

Mistry reminded that company law has evolved in democratic nations to “protect the rights of minority shareholders and strengthen corporate governance.” Likewise, in democracies—such as India—governance must be driven by accommodating the aspirations and opinions of the marginalised.

The Companies Act, 2013 “considerably strengthened the statutory protections accorded to minority shareholders from oppressive conduct of the majority shareholders.” The Indian Constitution and existing laws already provides this for social minorities and dissenting voices and there is no reason why violation of these by the state should go unquestioned. Mistry’s viewpoint regarding the Tata Group rings true for the nation too: “For Corporate Democracy to be strengthened, all stakeholders must operate within the ambit of law and statutorily enshrined protections.”

According to Mistry, for the past three years, “both in conduct and in their statements to the world at large, the Tata Group’s leadership has shown scant respect for the rights of minority shareholders.”

For the country however, this new dark era dawned in the summer of 2014. It only deepened in May 2019.

Mistry is an 18.37% shareholder. This figure has an uncanny Indian parallel: Muslims and Christians accounted for 16.5% of the total Indian population according to the 2011 Census. But, they are not the only targeted minorities in the country and their numbers is much more than the Shapoorji Pallonji Group is within the corporate giant. Yet, those targeted in India are still in the minority.

But the religious minority must know that “it is in our own interest to ensure the Group’s (read, the nation’s) long-term success. Poignantly, Mistry wrote: “My family, although a minority partner, has been a guardian of the Tata Group for over five decades.”

India’s pluralistic characteristic has been built on millions of Muslims—and other minorities—who chose to remain on ‘this’ side of the border at Partition. Those in the majority community who swore to never allow those Muslims to regret, even for a moment, the decision of their prior generations in 1947-48, must soldier on despite being termed placaters.

Mistry said the fight “was never about me. It has always been and will always be about protecting the rights of minority shareholders and upholding their right to demand a higher standard of corporate governance from controlling shareholders.”

Cyrus Mistry may have written for himself and his group within the Tata Group. But he has spoken for the marginalised and targeted in India. The government will predictably contend that the dispute within the Tata Group is an internal matter of the corporate world. But every word of Mistry has profound meaning for today’s pilloried minority.

The writer is a senior Delhi-based journalist and author. His latest book is The RSS: Icons of The Indian Right. The views are personal.