The brouhaha over the HDFC vote

If we want more nuanced shareholder voting, we need to ensure that pools of capital and their managers reside in India. This alone will ensure a win for Indian industry

Last month, in related but contrasting developments, foreign institutional investors jostled to put money — lots of it — into two HDFC group companies, its asset management business and the bank, while at the same time they almost succeeded in voting out its chairman, the very person on whose shoulders these institutions have been built. The vote was explained away as being on the advice given by two global proxy advisory firms but it did amplify a risk that Uday Kotak underlined a few months ago when he rhetorically asked and answered, “Who controls the so-called diversified foreign ownership? It