New Delhi: India’s richest man Mukesh Ambani has kept his annual salary from his flagship firm Reliance Industries capped at ₹15 crore ($2.1 million) for the eleventh year on the trot.
Ambani has kept salary, perquisites, allowances, and commission together at ₹15 crore since 2008-09, forgoing over ₹24 crore per annum.
This is at a time when remunerations of all whole-time directors of the company, including cousins Nikhil and Hital Meswani, saw a handsome increase in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2019.
“Compensation of Shri Mukesh D Ambani, Chairman, and Managing Director, has been set at ₹15 crore, reflecting his desire to continue to set a personal example for moderation in managerial compensation levels,” RIL said in its latest annual report.
His remuneration for 2018-19 included ₹4.45 crore as salary and allowances, which is marginally lower than ₹4.49 crore he got in the previous 2017-18 fiscal.
Commission has been unchanged at ₹9.53 crore while perquisites have risen to ₹31 lakh from ₹27 lakh. Retirement benefits were ₹71 lakh.
Ambani voluntarily capped his compensation at ₹15 crore in October 2009 amid a debate over right-sizing of CEO salaries. The salary cap continued even as all other executive directors saw their remunerations go up.
Ambani’s cousins Nikhil R Meswani and Hital R Meswani saw their compensation rise to ₹20.57 crore each. They earned ₹19.99 crore each in 2017-18 and ₹16.58 crore in 2016-17. In 2015-16, Nikhil had got ₹14.42 crore while Hital took home ₹14.41 crore. In 2014-15, they had got ₹12.03 crore each.
“Performance criteria for two Executive Directors, entitled for Performance Linked Incentive (PLI), are determined by the Human Resources, Nomination and Remuneration Committee,” RIL said in the annual report.
RIL’s non-executive directors, including Nita Ambani, also got₹1.65 crore each as commission, besides sitting fees. The commission was ₹1.5 crore in 2017-18 and ₹1.3 crore in the previous year.
Former State Bank of India (SBI) chairman Arundhati Bhattacharya got only ₹75 lakh as a commission as she was appointed to the board of RIL only with effect from October 17, 2018.
Ambani’s wife Nita Ambani, a non-executive director on the company’s board, earned ₹7 lakh as sitting fee, up from ₹6 lakh in the previous year.
Apart from Ambani, the RIL board has Meswani brothers, Prasad and Kapil as wholetime directors.
Besides Nita Ambani, other non-executive directors include Mansingh L Bhakta, Yogendra P Trivedi, Dipak C Jain, Raghunath A Mashelkar, Adil Zainulbhai, Raminder Singh Gujral, Shumeet Banerji and Aruundhati Bhattacharya.