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Mumbai: The latest MC CEO Pay Report reveals a sharp rise in executive compensation among India’s top corporate leaders. FY25 saw the emergence of a “₹100 crore club,” with Pawan Munjal of Hero MotoCorp and Rajeev Jain of Bajaj Finance each taking home over ₹100 crore in total pay.
Key High Earners
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Pawan Munjal saw his overall pay remain steady, though his fixed salary fell by nearly 23%, balanced by a 44% jump in bonus.
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Rajeev Jain received a 7% increase in fixed pay, alongside a bonus of ₹39 crore and stock awards worth ₹40.5 crore.
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S.N. Subrahmanyan, CEO of Larsen & Toubro, earned ₹60.37 crore, marking an 18% year-on-year increase.
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Rajiv Bajaj of Bajaj Auto earned ₹58.58 crore, while Mohit Joshi of Tech Mahindra received ₹53.9 crore, including stock options worth ₹30.8 crore.
Median CEO Pay Rises
A Deloitte India survey highlighted that the median CEO pay for non-promoter leaders has risen to ₹10 crore in FY25, representing a 13% increase from the previous year. Around 60% of this compensation is now performance-linked, split between short-term bonuses and long-term incentives.
Other top management roles, such as COO, CFO, and CHRO, saw salary hikes between 7% and 11%, with average packages nearing ₹4 crore.
Growing Pay Gap
The report points to an increasing disparity between CEO salaries and worker wages. Oxfam’s recent findings suggest that while average CEO pay in India is now close to US$2 million (around ₹17 crore), average worker wages have risen by only 0.9% in the same period.
In the IT sector, the median pay for top five Indian IT company CEOs has surged 160% in the last five years, reaching approximately ₹84 crore, while fresher salaries have grown by a mere 4%.
Company-Specific Highlights
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Infosys CEO Salil Parekh earned ₹80.6 crore in FY25, a 22% increase, with a pay package nearly 752 times the median employee salary of around ₹10.7 lakh.
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TCS CEO K. Krithivasan saw his pay rise 4.6% to ₹26.5 crore.
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Wipro CEO Srinivas Pallia received a compensation package of approximately ₹53.6 crore.
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HUL Managing Director Rohit Jawa earned ₹23.23 crore, up 3.75% compared to FY24.
Challenges and Risks
The report underlines growing concerns over governance and fairness, as CEO-to-employee pay ratios among Nifty 50 firms average around 290 times. While companies argue that performance-linked pay aligns executive interests with shareholder value, critics point out the stagnation in worker wages and the growing wealth gap.
Analyst View
Experts suggest that Indian firms are increasingly aligning executive pay with global benchmarks to retain top talent. However, with the focus shifting toward ESG and stakeholder fairness, there could be a greater push for more balanced compensation structures.
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