Naveen Jindal has topped the executive pay chart for listed companies in the country with a package of Rs. 73.42 crore for the last fiscal 2011-12, which grew by over Rs. six crore from previous year.
Jindal, Chairman and Managing Director of Jindal Steel and Power Ltd (JSPL), was followed by Sun TV Network’s Kalanithi and Kavery Maran (Rs. 57.01 crore each), Hero MotoCorp’s Pawan Munjal (Rs. 34.47 crore) and Brijmohan Lall Munjal (Rs. 34.44 crore) among the five top-paid executives.
These pay packages include salary, perquisites, profit-linked incentives or commissions and other benefits.
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Jindal remains the top-paid executive for the second consecutive year, after dislodging Kalanithi Maran last year.
The collective pay of the ten top-paid executives rose by Rs. 43 crore (over 12 per cent) to Rs. 387 crore during the fiscal that ended March 31, 2012, as per the data available with the companies that have so far published their respective annual reports.
Interestingly, the pay packages declined for only two - Kalanithi and Kavery Maran - in 2011-12, while the rest saw their remunerations fatten. Reliance Industries chief Mukesh Ambani, once the country’s highest-paid executive, was not in the top ten and was ranked 15th with a remuneration of Rs. 15 crore, which has remained unchanged for four consecutive years now.
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Interestingly, there are only four Sensex companies, whose top executives figure among the ten top-paid persons.
However, a majority of the Sensex companies, which are considered as the country’s top-30 blue chip firms, saw their top executives’ packages rise in 2011-12, even as industry titans like Mukesh Ambani, Kumar Mangalam Birla, Azim Premji and Sunil Mittal either took a pay cut or capped their salaries.
Mukesh’s younger brother Anil Ambani also saw his total remuneration from the four main companies of Reliance Group fall by nearly two-third during the year, although none of his group firms are currently part of the Sensex.