Tata DNA - no longer what it was

Over the last few weeks, there's been a spate of comments by senior people inside Tatas, that have had the effect of being a dampener on the stock price.

For a group that once had a reputation of high standards of corporate governance, this is becoming quite a strange pattern. If this was "real" stuff, and in the interest of disclosure, one would actually applaud the Tatas. But this doesn't seem like genuine disclosure.

Look at some of the articles below, and draw your own conclusion!

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com...hearted-cyrus-mistry/articleshow/53625814.cms

This is something you would NEVER EVER expect from the MD of a company! And especially not when the company is doing spectacularly well.

http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2011-05-21/news/29568738_1_jlr-scunthorpe-corus

This is older - but a great example of washing dirty linen in public - obviously won't help morale!

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com...rs-40000-cr-in-m-cap/articleshow/54163648.cms

And today, TCS giving vague hints about weakness in BFSI vertical. This is probably closer to a genuine disclosure - but there is something stinky about the timing, the move in the stock over the last 2-3 days, etc.

What is going on with the Tatas? Can one think of the Nira Radia disclosures as a one-off? Or has something changed in the DNA of the group itself?

It would really be sad if one of India's most reputed industrial houses changes in such undesirable ways.

Who are you to expect Tata group MDs to talk to media in certain way ??

Next you will say I expect sun to rise from the west.

market will price in everything and no CEO commentary can distrot stock prices for long.

It doesn't matter who I am. Point is, this is a company that was once renowned for corporate governance, and for its trustworthiness and credibility. They are rapidly losing that.

They have destroyed all the credibility they have with the Japanese, with how shabbily they have handled the DoCoMo case. Clearly, they are attempting to use the rules to escape from their obligations, instead of finding out ways to honor their obligations. And the Japanese don't forget these things easily.

At least if they get some tangible benefit out of losing their reputation, it might be a worthwhile trade off - but even that doesn't seem to be happening!