Mistry asks tribunal to block his removal from Tata Sons board

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Cyrus Mistry, the ousted chairman of India's Tata Sons, sought to block the company from removing him from its board in a petition filed with a national tribunal on Wednesday.

Tata Sons has called an extraordinary general meeting on Feb. 6 to remove Mistry from its board.

The $100 billion conglomerate ousted Mistry as chairman in October, sparking a bitter public spat, but he remains a director.

Tata Sons is the holding company of listed Tata group companies in a business empire ranging from Jaguar Land Rover and steel mills to aviation and salt pans.

Mistry contested his removal from the board in the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), a quasi-judicial body that deals with corporate grievances in India.

In a filing seen by Reuters, Mistry said that, by moving to remove him from the board, Tata Sons was violating an NCLT order asking both sides not to take any action until a preliminary ruling on Feb. 1.

In the document, Mistry also seeks the imprisonment of his fellow Tata Sons board members, including interim Chairman Ratan Tata, over his allegation that they violated the tribunal's order.

Tata Sons denied being in contempt of the NCLT order and said it would give its response to the tribunal.

Ratan Tata, patriarch of one of India's most influential families, took over as interim chairman of Tata Sons after the ousting of Mistry, who had sought to shake up the firm's management.

While the board gave no detailed reason for the change of chairman, some media reports said there has been discontent with some of Mistry's actions, including asset sales.

(Reporting by Suvashree Dey Choudhury, Promit Mukherjee, Aditi Shah and Sankalp Phartiyal; Editing by Adrian Croft)