Prince Asirvatham, who will head HLL's treasury and M&A activities, fills in the gap left by VK Vishwanathan. Gurbir Singh, who has taken over as the company's director, human resources and corporate affairs, with effect from August 1998, will replace Aniruddha Lahiri, former director (personnel). Lahiri has been reassigned a senior vice-president posting at Unilever.

Prior to his Brazil assignment, Asirvatham, 48, was the vice-president (commercial) of the erstwhile Brooke Bond Lipton India Ltd. Before this he was treasurer of HLL. Vishwanathan succeeded Asirvatham as the company's treasurer and financial controller in early 1994.

Asirvatham moved to Brazil as regional audit manager for Latin America in 1994. Gurbir Singh, 54, was posted as technical director for Unilever's flagship Gessy Lever in Brazil. In his earlier stint with the Indian operation, Gurbir Singh was vice-president, technical (detergents). Singh was also on the management committee of HLL in 1990 as vice-president, detergent.

Vishwanathan resigned from HLL a few months back to join German auto component major Mico Bosch. In fact, the post of group treasurer and head of M&A was created by exhalting Vishwanathan, the then financial controller. SP Mustafa of Pond's India had taken over from Vishwanathan as group controller in charge of finance. Mustafa last held the post of vice-president (finance and personnel) with Pond's.

A few months back, HLL saw a spate of senior-level changes with vice-chairman R Gopalakrishnan opting for retirement to join the House of Tatas as executive director and the resignation of Vishwanathan as an unrelated simultaneous move.

The company also witnessed a reshuffle of its top functionary following the merger announcement of Pond's India with HLL in March this year. Uday Khanna, director (exports) of Hindustan Lever, took over as head of corporate financial audits for all North American businesses of Unilever. The move was in tandem with the Pond's India managing director V Balaraman being asked to take over as director (exports). Prior to the merger announcement, Harish Manwani was inducted into the board of Pond's while Balaraman was taken on the HLL board.