India’s storied corporate behemoth, the Tata Group is battling a wrenching boardroom revolt and succession battle over whether Natarajan Chandrasekaran should continue as its chairman in his third term or, as demanded by Noel Tata, the scion of the Tata family controlling a majority stake, that he should step down. At the superficial level it seems like a clash between two giant egos but in reality, the upheaval, which has India riveted, takes in its sweep a complex set of corporate, regulatory and, to some extent, even political forces.

The group with a market cap of close to 300 billion dollars and the latest revenue of 185 billion dollars has witnessed stock market losses because of the boardroom fight to the tune of about four billion dollars. To unpack the complicated goings-on MCR spoke to Madhavan Narayanan, a well-known journalist, columnist and editor who has tracked the conglomerate, originally founded in 1868, since the 1990s.

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