Saurabh Agrawal to head Tata insurance JVs

Saurabh Agrawal, group CFO at Tata Sons, is set to become the chairman of Tata AIA Life Insurance and Tata AIG General Insurance, replacing group veteran Ishaat Hussain who retires next week after turning 70. Agrawal, a seasoned investment banker, is one of the key hires of Tata Sons Chairman N Chandrasekaran since he took over the reins of the $104-billion Tata group in February.

The board of Tata Teleservices has given a clean chit to Chennai-based entrepreneur, C Sivasankaran saying the allegations by former Tata group chairman Cyrus Mistry that undue favours worth ~600 crore were given to Sivasankaran because of his proximity to group patriarch Ratan Tata are untrue.

In its annual report for the year ended March 2017, Tata Teleservices director Ishaat Hussain and MD and CEO N Srinath said it has also been alleged by Mistry in the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) that the Siva Group has unduly benefited by ~600 crore through contracts granted by the company to the Siva Group in the period 2003 to 2008. “Tata Teleservices has benefited significantly from the services performed by the Siva Group and this has been duly considered by the board of directors,” the directors said without elaborating on what services were provided by Sivasankaran.

The Mistry-owned companies had also alleged in the NCLT that Tata Teleservices was influenced in 2006 to issue shares to entities controlled by C Sivasankaran at a “throwaway” price.