(Bloomberg) -- Hindustan Unilever Ltd. announced plans to separate the roles of chairman and chief executive officer as Unilever Plc's India unit seeks to boost governance standards.
Nitin Paranjpe, currently the chief operating officer of Unilever, will be taking over as the non-executive chairman of the Indian subsidiary, while Sanjiv Mehta will continue as the chief executive and the managing director, Hindustan Unilever said in an exchange filing Thursday. The change will be effective from March 31.
The move by maker of Hellmann's mayonnaise and Dove soaps is an exception among large Indian corporates firms, many of whom cited “difficulties and challenges” before India's capital market regulator in undertaking this measure. Earlier this month, the Securities and Exchange Board of India made the splitting of these two roles voluntary rather than mandatory as the top 500 local companies failed to achieve satisfactory compliance.
SEBI first notified rules separating chairman, CEO and managing director roles in May 2018 later and extended the deadline for compliance from April 2020 to April 2022. Despite the extended deadline, only 54% of firms complied with the rule as of December 2021, according to the regulator.
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