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New Delhi: The swords drawn between the trustees of the Tata Trusts shows the lack of trust within the Board. Late industrialist Ratan Tata handed over his legacy guns to his close confidant Mehli Mistry for decades. But now the battle to dominate the legacy guns suggests that this battle between the trustees of Mistry and the Tata Trusts will be stretched.
Mistry M. Pallonji heads the group, which has interests in shipping, dredging and auto dealerships. His appointment at the time was seen by the late Tata group mentor handing over the command of the philanthropic entities that control this prestigious business group to his key associates.
Mistry had expressed his appreciation for Ratan Tata when he was appointed to the board of Tata Trusts in 2022. After this, he said that he considers Ratan Tata as his mentor. Then Mistry said one more thing, “I will do what he (Ratan Tata) wants me to do. I have to protect their interests at all times.”
After Cyrus Mistry was removed from the post of Chairman of Tata Sons in 2016, there was a long confrontation between Tata-Mistry, which also came out openly in different forums.
According to a Mint report, close people pointed out that Mehli Mistry would give a legal challenge to his expulsion, leading to another major battle between Tata-Mistry in the courts, which would involve different individuals, this time in the new circumstances.
A few days after the demise of Ratan Tata last year, it was Mehli Mistry who proposed to appoint Noel Tata as the chairman of two main Tata Trusts. Noel Tata was one of the three trustees who excluded Mistry from the same trusts.
Tata Trusts is a comprehensive organization, which includes 15 philanthropic organizations. Of these, 6 have shares in Tata Sons. Sir Ratan Tata Trusts and Sir Dorabji Tata Trust, on whose board Mistry was a trustee, hold 27.98 percent and 23.56 percent shares of Tata Sons, respectively. Small trusts own the remaining 14.38 percent shares, whereby Tata Trusts owns 65.9 percent shares of Tata Sons.
The Shapoorji Pallonji family owns 18.38 percent stake in Tata Sons, whereas 9 Tata group companies own 12.86 percent stake. 7 persons own the remaining 2.87 percent shares of Tata Sons. Noel is the largest individual shareholder, holding 1 percent of the shares. Ratan Tata had 0.83 percent shares in his name and his brother Jimmy owns 0.81 percent.
Mistry is also a relative of Noel Tata's wife. Mehli's mother and Cyrus, Aloo, Shapur and Laila Mistry were sisters. Noel Tata is married to Aloo Mistry. Shapoor Mistry is the chairman of Shapoorji Pallonji Group.
Mehli Mistry's grandfather lived in England, where his mother was born. After this, the family took refuge in Ireland during World War II, where the mother of Shapur and Aloo Mistry was born. This small thing is important even today, because Mehli Mistry has a British passport, while Shapur Mistry, his sister Aloo and Noel Tata are Irish citizens.
Mehli Mistry and Aloo Mistry are also related to the ancestral side. His father was a cousin. His great-grandfather established a small construction company called Littlewood Pallonji in 1865, which was the ancestor of both the Shapoorji Pallonji group and the M Pallonji group.
Mehli's father Kersap Mistry then started a business that used to take contracts for painting and coating on an industrial level. Under the leadership of Mehli and his brother Firoz, this business expanded into the fields of dredging, barging and shipping. The growth of the Pallonji group was closely linked to the Tata group and the two houses have had business ties since the 1950s. Along with Tata Power in the 1990s, the group diversified into the dredging sector. Today, it also runs several Tata Motors dealerships through Sterling Motors.
The close relationship between Tata and Mistry put Mehli in a difficult position 9 years ago, when a dispute broke out between Ratan Tata and Cyrus Mistry.
