Wait, who is Cyrus Mistry?

To answer that, we first need to quickly review the history of the Tatas empire.

The Tata Group: Founded in 1868, the $314 billion business is most often described as a “salt-to-software conglomerate”—whose 30 companies are involved across every sector, ranging from tech to hotels to automobiles. 

• The apex company in the Tata Group is Tata Sons which holds a controlling stake in these companies, and oversees their operations. 
• In turn, Tata Trusts holds a 66% stake in Tata Sons, and oversees its board.
• The present Tata Sons chairman is N Chandrasekaran—the first non-Parsi outsider to lead the Tata Group.
• Ratan Tata is the chairman of Tata Trusts.

The grand old man: Ratan Tata is one of the most revered icons of India Inc. Over a historic 21-year career as chairman—from 1991 to 2012—he took the Tata Group to dizzying heights. Under his leadership, the Tata empire’s profits grew 50x—and he executed a number of splashy mergers including the acquisition of Land Rover Jaguar and Tetley Tea. He is often described as the "Chairman of Corporate India". 

The exiled heir: Cyrus Pallonji Mistry trained as a civil engineer in Imperial College. He worked most of his career at the Tatas and his family business. The two families, however, have a longstanding business and personal relationship: 

• There is no established account of how the Mistrys hitched their fortunes to the Tatas. The Economic Times says that JRD Tata’s younger brother, Dorab, sold his shares in a fit of rage to Shapoorji Pallonji Mistry. 
• A Tata Group insider claimed that Mistry got the shares in 1936 when he bought out a company that owned equity in Tata Sons. 
• But, a 2003 letter written by the Mistry group says they first bought shares only in 1965—from JRD’s sister Sylla. 
• Cyrus is the younger son of Pallonji Mistry who used to head the Shapoorji Pallonji Group. The company holds an 18.37% stake in Tata Sons, and is its single largest minority shareholder. 
• Also: Cyrus' sister is married to Ratan Tata's half-brother Noel. 
• Interesting fact: Pallonji and his two sons hold an Irish passport—and are the richest family in Ireland. The Mistrys are among the ten richest families in India—with a net worth of $16.1 billion. Mistry senior alone was worth $15 billion.

Point to note: Almost everyone who knew Mistry describes him as an intelligent and effective leader—who, above all, was “scrupulously honest” and “incapable of guile.”

So what happened between Ratan Tata and Mistry?

Here’s how the heir apparent became the black sheep:

• In 2011, Cyrus Mistry was made deputy chairman of Tata Sons—with the explicit understanding that he was being groomed for Ratan Tata’s job.
• In 2012, Tata retired and Mistry took his place as chairman of Tata Sons. But things went south between the two men fairly quickly. 
• Mistry was forced out in 2016 in a surprise Tata Sons board meeting—and Ratan Tata replaced him as its interim chairman.
• Among the reasons offered by Tata: the $5 billion dip in the group’s value over the course of just one year, 2015-16. 
• The reasons offered by Mistry: He was forced to leave because he “had confronted and was grappling with serious governance problems and ethical issues for a considerable period of time."
• At the time, most observers viewed the ouster as an “internal culture clash” between the old guard and the new. Mistry wanted Tata to lay off, and he simply refused to let go.
• In January 2017, Tata quickly replaced Mistry with Chandrasekaran—and converted Tata Sons from a publicly held company to a private enterprise that September. 
• The reason: the Mistrys would now require the board’s approval to sell their shares, despite being the biggest single shareholder. 

Point to note: Despite the allegations of incompetence, the Tatas empire thrived under Mistry—witnessing a 35% jump in annual profits. And the irony is that Chandrasekaran pushed through many of Mistry’s plans after his departure. In the end, Mistry’s only real blunder was going up against Ratan Tata. 

The legal drama: that followed unfolded like this:

• Mistry filed a suit challenging his removal in the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT)—which dismissed Mistry’s claims in fairly damning language. 
• Mistry appealed that ruling in the appellate tribunal (NCLAT)—which issued an astonishing reversal in December. 
• It declared the appointment of Chandrasekaran illegal, and ordered the reinstatement of Mistry as chairman. It also held that the move to convert Tata Sons into a private company was “illegal.”
• Tata Sons appealed the decision in the Supreme Court—which ruled decisively in their favour in 2021, upholding its right to remove Mistry. 
• What was remarkable: The Court’s scathing ruling that ripped Mistry apart: “A person who tries to set his own house on fire for not getting what he perceives as legitimately due to him, does not deserve to continue as part of any decision-making body.”
• Earlier this year, the Court led by NV Ramanna turned down Mistry’s request to review the decision—but agreed to take out some of the language used against him. 

The ugly aftermath: Mistry returned to his family business the Shapoorji Pallonji Group—a real estate empire that ran into serious financial trouble due to the pandemic. And the Tatas did their best to compound their misery. 

The Tata Sons’ Articles of Association states:  “[I]f any shareholder of Tata Sons wants to sell his/her shares, then he has to first offer it to Tata Sons. Tata Sons will then decide a fair market value and offer it to the shareholder.” The Tatas refused to agree on a valuation of the stake—lowballing it at a mere Rs 800 billion (80,000 crore). Worse, they blocked the Mistrys from pledging their shares to raise money to pay off their debts.  

So how did Mistry die?

Mistry was driving back to Mumbai after attending a prayer ceremony with his friends, the Pandoles. He was seated in the back without a seat belt. According to the cops, Anahita Pandole was driving the car—and was likely speeding and made a fatal error:

“We checked the earlier accidents records but none had taken place on the spot where this one happened. It looks like the car was speeding and there was an error in the judgement of the driver while taking the bridge. Since the road narrowed to two lanes from three, the driver could not shift from left to right and lost control of the wheel and rammed into the divider.” 

54-year-old Mistry is survived by his wife and two sons.

Point to note: Cyrus’ father Pallonji died earlier this year. So Mistry’s death—which leaves the company leader-less—will be yet another blow to its fortunes. Its fate now rests in the hands of his brother Shapoor. 

The bottomline: Coomi Kapoor writes in the Indian Express: “The Tatas, as one Parsi businessman put it to me, considered themselves aristocratic and noble, and the Mistrys mere real estate people.” Sadly, Mistry’s lasting legacy may be the fact that he unwittingly helped destroy that genteel veneer—and expose the petty vindictiveness that lay beneath.

Reading list

The Telegraph offers an overview, while Indian Express and Economic Times have the most details on the crash. These older pieces in Outlook magazine, The Telegraph and Business Standard have the most details on the breakup between Mistry and the Tatas. Economic Times has a gossipy report from December on why Cyrus and Ratan fell out. Bloomberg Quint explains how the Mistrys entered the Tata khandaan. Business Insider offers a personal profile of Cyrus Mistry.