In light of the changes in shareholding, the Chairman and the Founder of Zee Entertainment Enterprises, Subhash Chandra has stepped down from his role.

In a stock exchange filing the company said, “The board accepted his resignation and noted that this is in line with the requirements of Regulation 17 (lB) of SEBI Listing Regulations, which inter alia mandates that the Chairperson of the Board shall not be related to the Managing Director or the Chief Executive Officer of the company. He will remain as Non Executive Director of the company.”

It can be recalled that the company was in debt from the last few years, and it has sold a lot of stock to repay the debt. Last week some of the foreign funds such as BlackRock, HSBC Global, Fidelity India, SBI Mutual Fund and Reliance Mutual Fund bought the pledged promoter stake in ZEEL through a series of block deals on, reducing Chandra’s stake in the company to just 5%. 

One of the pioneers of the Indian television who founded ZEE in 1992 and brought the cable television to India will not be associated with the company in the C-suite role. He also launched Dish TV in 2003 as the first satellite television provider in India. 

In the latest development, the company held a meeting and completed the process of reconstitution of the board and appointed three new independent directors in lieu of two independent and one nominee Director of Essel Group, namely Niharika Vora, Sunil Sharma and Subodh Kumar, respectively.

What's next

This will not be considered a big blow to the company because Punit Goenka, the current Managing Director and CEO of the company, was actively looking after the organization from last many years. He has transformed ZEE in multiple ways by launching viewer’s specific channels with a particular focus on the OTT and digital platforms. 

Image source: Free Press Journal