Time is running out for the Sir Ratan Tata Trust (SRTT) to secure a seat at the Tata Sons annual general meeting next week, with repeated attempts to obtain interim relief from a Maharashtra Charity Commissioner directive barring the trust from convening meetings proving unsuccessful so far.
With the AGM scheduled for 2:30 pm on Tuesday, August 18, SRTT has less than two working days to win a reprieve from the ban.
“In the absence of any relief from the charity commissioner, the Trusts could approach the Bombay High Court. In fact, it is a step they should have taken much earlier,” a legal expert said.
Legal experts believe SRTT could mount a strong challenge to the directive, particularly since the trust had filed caveats with both the charity authority and the Bombay High Court. “In its statement reacting to the charity commissioner’s directive, Tata Trusts had stressed that the decision was taken ex parte (without hearing the Trusts). They have a strong argument to approach a higher judicial authority,” another person close to the development said.
The inability to meet has created more than a backlog of unapproved grants. As one of the two key promoter trusts, SRTT plays a pivotal role in decision-making at the highest level of the Tata ecosystem, and several decisions requiring board resolutions remain in limbo.
The most pressing is the AGM itself: SRTT and the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust (SDTT) must jointly nominate a member to represent Tata Trusts, the largest promoter entity, at the meeting. A second has emerged since chairman N Chandrasekaran’s decision not to seek reappointment when his term ends in February next year — the constitution of the selection committee that will recommend his successor. Under the Tata Sons Articles of Association, that committee must include three members jointly nominated by the two trusts, which again requires SRTT to hold meetings.
According to people close to the matter, SRTT wrote to the Charity Commissioner late last week seeking temporary permission to convene. It has so far been unsuccessful.
The directive was issued on May 15, on the eve of a crucial Tata Trusts meeting, and will remain in force until an ongoing investigation into alleged governance lapses at the trust is completed. There is no clarity on what stage the inquiry has reached or when it might conclude.
One hurdle, people close to the matter said, is that SRTT and the complainant — represented by advocate Katyayani Agrawal — have been unable to agree on a common date to appear before the investigating authority, the assistant charity commissioner. “There is no hearing date decided as of now, and so the proceedings will take long. There may also be multiple hearings,” a person with knowledge of the matter said. Agrawal’s complaint includes an allegation that SRTT is in violation of the cap on lifetime trustees under the Maharashtra Public Trusts Act.
Since May, other trusts under the Tata umbrella have continued to meet and conduct business while SRTT has stood still.
Some experts, however, said the high court has its own limits. Experts broadly agree that while the trust could secure some interim relief — “the high court is well within its rights to grant interim relief if the Trusts make a strong case of the need to convene meetings temporarily,” the legal expert said — immediate and complete relief may be harder to obtain.
Nor is the underlying investigation likely to be fast-tracked. Experts pointed to a Supreme Court directive asking higher courts to refrain from fixing rigid, automatic timelines for lower courts and authorities to dispose of cases, as blanket deadlines could amount to judicial overreach. The inquiry, in other words, will run its own course — and the ban on SRTT meetings may well outlast the deadlines that matter most.