Mallika Srinivasan has challenged her husband Venu Srinivasan’s assertion that all family matters have been settled, saying no economic settlement has been reached within the family and that their daughter, Lakshmi Venu, has the same rights as her brother, Sudarshan Venu.
“No economic settlement has taken place within the Venu Srinivasan family,” said Mallika, chairperson and managing director of Tractors and Farm Equipment Ltd (TAFE), in her first on-record telephonic interview on the ownership dispute within the family behind TVS Motor Co., one of India’s largest two-wheeler makers. “I do believe that the legitimate economic interests of both children must be recognised fairly and equitably,” she said.
Mallika said she had “consistently supported an amicable resolution through family dialogue” and remained “hopeful that a fair and transparent settlement can be reached at the earliest.”
“The suggestion that all family assets belong exclusively to one individual, who is therefore free to distribute them unilaterally, is neither an agreed nor an established position,” Mallika and her daughter Lakshmi said in a separate statement issued on Monday.
Her comments come after Mint reported last Friday, citing an executive privy to the development, that Lakshmi was seeking “a fair settlement” with her younger brother, Sudarshan.
At the heart of the dispute is a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in March 2024, which Mallika says covers only brand rights and related obligations, not the ownership of family assets or an economic settlement.
“The March 2024 MoU concerned arrangements relating to trademarks, brand usage and non-compete obligations only,” she said. “Economic settlement and ownership are not within the scope of the MoU.”
Mallika also drew a distinction between running the businesses and owning them. “It would be pertinent to point out here that management and ownership are fundamentally distinct and should not be conflated,” she said.
An email sent to Venu Srinivasan seeking comment went unanswered.
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Control through VS Trust
The ownership question is significant because of the trusts and holding companies through which the family holds its stakes in the group. As the sole trustee of VS Trust, Venu Srinivasan controls stakes of 46.83% in Sundaram-Clayton Ltd and 66.55% in TVS Holdings Ltd.
The Srinivasan family owns 59.09% of Sundaram-Clayton. VS Trust holds 46.83%, while a part of the family owns 6.87% through TSF Investments Ltd. Venu Srinivasan owns 4.38% personally, while Mallika and Lakshmi own 0.26% and 0.75%, respectively.
TVS Holdings owns 56% of TVS Motor. The family owns 74.45% of TVS Holdings: VS Trust holds 66.55%, Srinivasan Trust, whose trustee is VS Trustee Pvt. Ltd, holds 3.07%, and a family branch owns 3.74% through TSF Investments. Mallika and Lakshmi hold 0.29% and 0.82%, respectively.
Asked whether Lakshmi benefits from VS Trust on an equal footing with her brother, Mallika did not answer directly. She said her daughter’s rights were equal and that Lakshmi had been surprised by information about the actual ownership of the family’s assets.
Since then, Mallika said, “repeated requests for transparency, information and conversation have been met with silence or refusal.”
“As a mother, my view is that a daughter and a son are equal in every respect from a moral as well as legal perspective,” she said.
Mallika said she would continue to seek “a fair and equitable settlement of economic interest with respect to the family wealth through a transparent process”. Such a process, she said, should involve “the full participation of all family members” and seek “to address the perspectives, priorities and aspirations of every family member”.
Asked what a fair settlement would look like, and whether it should include a share of TVS Holdings and TVS Motor, she replied: “Equality must be the cornerstone of a fair settlement.”
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TAFE kept out
Mallika rejected the suggestion that her and Lakshmi’s ownership in TAFE should reduce their claims to ownership in the TVS Group.
“References to TAFE in the context of the VS (Venu Srinivasan) family assets are not relevant,” she said. “It is not Mallika’s or anyone else’s outside the Amalgamations Group to unilaterally decide upon and hence, any attempt to present it as a part of VS Family settlement is misleading,” she said.
Mallika’s grandfather, S. Anantharamakrishnan, founded the Amalgamations Group, which owns TAFE. The company is owned by six family groups, with the Krishnamoorthy family holding 40% and the Venkataramani family, represented by N. Venkataramani, holding 20%. Mallika and four others — Lakshmi Narayanan, Shankar Sundaram and Murali Srinivasan Venkatraman — hold 10% each, according to its shareholding pattern filed with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs as of 31 March 2025.
The latest developments at the 115-year-old TVS Group, founded by Venu Srinivasan’s grandfather, T.V. Sundaram Iyengar, follow a 2020 division of businesses among the group’s current patriarch and his brothers.
For Venu Srinivasan, vice-chairman of Tata Trusts, the family dispute comes amid a separate contest over control of Tata Sons, the holding company of the Tata Group. On 17 September, Tata Trusts chairman Noel Tata opposed the reappointment of N. Chandrasekaran as Tata Sons chairman for a third term. Venu Srinivasan’s crucial vote helped Chandrasekaran secure the appointment.
The dispute involves the fourth generation of the family, including Lakshmi, 43, who is managing director of listed die-casting company Sundaram-Clayton. Her younger brother, Sudarshan, 37, is chairman and managing director of TVS Motor.
Sundaram-Clayton reported revenue of ₹2,025.6 crore and profit of ₹334.27 crore, compared with TVS Motor’s revenue of ₹56,069 crore and profit of ₹3,693 crore. Sudarshan also oversees the financial services businesses TVS Credit and Home Credit.
At Monday’s close, Sundaram-Clayton had a market capitalization of ₹2,650 crore, while TVS Motor’s stood at ₹1.87 trillion.
The TVS family dispute is the latest in a series of succession battles involving prominent Indian business families. The mother and widow of the late Sunjay Kapur are fighting over the Sona Group fortune, with a Supreme Court-appointed mediator involved in the dispute. Sugandha Hiremath, sister of billionaire Baba Kalyani, is seeking a third of the Kalyani family’s assets.
At Godfrey Phillips, Samir Modi has been fighting his mother, Bina Modi, for control, although he has withdrawn all legal cases. The Kirloskar family dispute remains before the courts.