Tata Motors MD Telang retires; two exec directors appointed

Tata Motors managing director India operations P M Telang retired from the company on Thursday, a company statement said. He was 65.

The company does not seem anxious to find an immediate replacement - overall responsibility for the firm would be held by an interim committee comprising Tata Motors chairman Ratan Tata and vice-chairman Ravi Kant, the statement said.

Meanwhile the company has appointed two new executive directors. Ravindra Pisharody, currently president of the commercial vehicles business unit, has been appointed executive director (commercial vehicles); while Satish Borwankar, senior vice-president (manufacturing operations - commercial vehicles business unit), has been appointed executive director quality, vendor development & strategic sourcing.

Pisharody, 56, is an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur and the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta. He has been with the company since 2007. In his new position, he will continue to spearhead the commercial vehicle business of the company which generates about 70 per cent of the turnover at the stand-alone level.

Observers believe that he is being groomed for the MD's post, as Telang was also appointed executive director of commercial vehicles in 2007 before his elevation two years later.

Borwankar, 59, is a Tata Motors veteran, having been with the company since 1974. He was recently promoted to senior vice-president from being plant head of the Jamshepur plant, where Tata Motors makes trucks and buses.