Shikha Sharma may stay at ICICI Pru, to report to Kamath

ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Managing Director and CEO Shikha Sharma is likely to stay back at the financial services group but the internal reporting structure may be tweaked in a way that she continues to report to K V Kamath.

Kamath is to give up his job as ICICI Bank Managing Director and CEO and take over as the non-executive chairman from May 1. At present, Kamath is also the chairman of the bank’s subsidiaries, including ICICI Prudential, while his mentor N Vaghul is the non-executive chairman of the bank.

When contacted, Sharma said: “I am not going anywhere and I am not aware of any change in the structure.” However, sources told Business Standard that Kamath would be appointed as the non-executive chairman of the life insurance company and Sharma would report to him.

Sources at ICICI Prudential said that there was no communication to the effect that Sharma will report to Chanda Kochhar once she steps into Kamath’s shoes.

Following Kochhar’s elevation from joint managing director and CFO to the post of Managing Director and CEO, many bank executives who were her contemporaries or seniors at the group, including Sharma started looking out for jobs outside the financial services firm. Sources said that Sharma had been approached by Axis Bank o join as the managing director and CEO of the third-largest private sector bank but she has not heard from them. “There is no truth in my joining Axis Bank,” she said.

But sources said that Sharma was still the frontrunner for Axis Bank managing Director and CEO’s job once, P J Nayak steps down in July.