HDFC Bank on Saturday said the reappointment processes for both Chairman Keki Mistry and Managing Director & CEO Sashidhar Jagdishan are underway, with the nomination and remuneration committee (NRC) and the board “seized of the matter”. Jagdishan’s term ends in October this year, while Mistry has received a temporary three-month extension from the Reserve Bank of India post the resignation of part-time chairman Atanu Chakraborty in March.
Jagdishan said the bank is following the statutory sequence of approvals and disclosures. “The NRC and the board are fully engaged with the process, and the required disclosures will be made at the appropriate time,” he said, adding that the legal review related to the former chairman’s resignation is still in progress due to the volume of material involved.
The bank also strongly pushed back against allegations of mis-selling AT1 bonds in Dubai and of coercive insurance sales in India. Jagdishan said HDFC Bank had introduced industry leading guardrails for third party product sales as early as 2015-16, including pre verification, checks, video confirmations and exclusion lists for vulnerable segments.
“There is a wrong perception about our sales practices. The data over the last decade shows a completely different picture,” Jagdishan said. He added that while occasional lapses may occur in a 215,000 strong workforce, such cases are addressed ‘swiftly and sternly’, and the bank may publish mis-selling related data to correct misconceptions.