Relationship with Infosys founders is 'wonderful': CEO Vishal Sikka

Clearing rumours about a rift with Infosys co-founders, the company's Chief Executive Officer Vishal Sikka on Monday said that his relationship with them is "wonderful".

Sikka was delivering a keynote address at Kotak's Chasing Growth Conference in Mumbai today. 

At the event, Sikka said that his relationship with one of the co-founders, Narayan Murthy, is wonderful and they meet frequently. He also said that media reports on Murthy's disappointment with him are "distracting".

On Friday, Murthy had admitted that he was "distressed" by what was happening at the Infosys board. He was quoted as saying, "The issue is not with Vishal Sikka, but with the quality of governance at the board. It has slipped."

Infosys' former CFO, T V Mohandas Pai also urged institutional investors to raise questions about the huge cash pile on the company's books and governance issues, as investors have an obligation to protect their investment.

"Capital allocation is very important. Institutional investors should raise those questions. They have a duty...Institutional investors should raise questions on governance because it concerns the company's reputation," Pai had told PTI in an interview.

Responding to that, on Monday, Sikka said that the company will consider capital allocation policy time-to-time. 

Last week, there were reports on trouble brewing inside Infosys, when a Time of India report had said that the relationship between founders of the company and Sikka are "less than ideal." 

Infosys founders -- N. R. Narayana Murthy, K. Dinesh, Nandan Nilekani, Ashok Arora, S. D. Shibulal, Kris Gopalakrishnan, N. S. Raghavan, have raised their concerns over the board's decision of giving a huge severance pay to former CFO Rajiv Bansal and former legal counsel David Kennedy. They also had worries about the huge $11 million compensation allocated to Sikka and the appointment of Union Minister Jayant Sinha's wife Punita Kumar-Sinha as an independent director. 

Last year in May, the company had revealed that it had alloted Rs 23.02 crore severance pay, salary and other benefits to outgoing CFO Bansal. He had resigned from the post in October 2015 but was to stay on as an advisor to the CEO and the company till December. However, the company is said to have reportedly halted the payout after two instalments after questions were raised about the hefty severance pay. 

After Bansal, Michael Reh, an executive VP, and David Kennedy, legal counsel were given huge severance pays when they decided to quit.

On Thursday, Sikka, asked employees not to get distracted by speculations that question the company's commitment to "governance, integrity and values". 

He had asked them to keep a "sharp focus" on executing the company's strategy, which is bolstered by its services like Mana, Skava, Edge, Panaya and cloud services.