Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy said he still reserved his concerns about the corporate governance at the company, even as he affirmed his faith in the board members by saying that they are all good-intentioned people. “People on the Infosys Board are all good intentioned people of high integrity, Infosys Co-founder N R Narayana Murthy on Monday said that even good people sometimes make mistakes and this is one such case.”
“No, I have not withdrawn my concern. They have to be addressed properly by the Board and full transparency should be displayed and people responsible for it should become accountable,” said Mr Murthy.
The rift between founders of the company and its board spilled out in the open on Friday with Murthy questioning executive compensation and corporate governance at India’s second biggest software services exporter led by Vishal Sikka. Sikka is the first non-founder CEO of the company.
Asked about his view on the integrity of Infosys board members,”good leadership demands that they listen to all concerned shareholders, re-evaluate their decisions, and take corrective action. I hope they take corrective action soon and improve governance for a better future for the company,” he added.
Over the last few days, Infosys has come under fire from co-founders like Murthy who have publicly raised concerns on alleged corporate governance lapses at Infosys.
Earlier, raising the corporate governance concerns he had clarified that it was not the management that concerns him.”I think we are quite happy with (CEO) Vishal Sikka. He is doing a good job. However, what concerns some of us particularly the founders, and seniors, former Infoscions is that there have been certain acts of governance that could have been better,” Murthy said.
Some of the founders have aired concerns about CEO Vishal Sikka’s USD 11 million pay and expensive severance packages paying the former CFO (Rajiv Bansal) a 30-month severance pay which amounted to Rs 23 crore and $868,250 to David Kennedy (General Counsel).
Infosys has, however, defended itself saying all decisions were made in the overall interest of the company and that it has made, full disclosures on all developments.
