Infosys board members to resign for Nandan Nilekani's return

Nilekani is said to have asked for a clean board before he takes over at Infosys.

In a shake-up at Infosys Technologies that will likely see its celebrated co-founder Nandan Nilekani coming back, a decade after quitting the company, a majority of the board members at India's second-largest software company have offered to resign.

 
The restructuring of the board was also one of the conditions set by Nilekani for his return – to have a clean slate before he takes charge at the company he co-founded – said sources.
 
A few independent board members have maintained that they would not quit, but an imminent board restructuring is expected before the weekend, when Nilekani would head the company he co-founded with N R Narayana Murthy and five others in 1981.
 
Nilekani's restructured board could potentially retain D N Prahlad, a former Infosys employee and was recommended to the board  by Murthy; Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, a friend of the Infosys family and Ravi Venkatesan, the co-chairman.
 
Shaw dismissed this as speculative rumours.  Nilekani and Venkatesan did not respond for comments. 
 
"The company does not have any further updates to share at this point of time. In case there are any developments we will inform the media in due course. We will not be making any comments on speculation and rumours,"  said an Infosys spokesperson.
Nilekani is being brought in under pressure from institutional investors, Infosys and founder N R Narayana Murthy. 
 
 
The yearlong concern by Murthy, who has raised the failure corporate governance in Infosys, saw a fallout with the resignation of Vishal Sikka, the first non founder of Infosys. Infosys blamed Murthy in a statement for Sikka's exit at  a time when the IT services sector was undergoing turmoil due to automation, growing protectionism and shift towards digital.
 

Since last Friday, when Sikka resigned from Infosys, the company's shares plunged worrying investors to write to the Infosys board and Murthy to bring back Nilekani.