TOP 20 Chief Financial Officer (CFO) in India

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In recent times, the role of a CFO in an organization has undergone vast changes. A CFO is not only just a financial authority but a strategic partner to the CEO, supporting in the crucial decision-making and application of strategic methods in the company. Besides making responsible decisions about investment, CFOs today are expected to remain updated with the latest technologies. At present, Indian companies are gearing up for global competition and their outlook is extremely futuristic. With this outlook in hand, the role of CFOs is even more significant. India is one of the best countries in Asia in terms of its geography, culture, and heritage. In the business sector, it has improved significantly over time. Listed down are the top 10 CFOs in India based on their performance, credibility, and talent.

Alok Agarwal

Mr Alok Kumar Agarwal serves as Chief Financial Officer of Reliance. Mr. Alok Kumar Agarwal heads the Wholesale Group at the Company which includes the corporate and financial inclusion business. Mr. Alok Kumar Agarwal started his career in 1989 with Reliance Industries Ltd. as an Engineer. He later worked with ICICI Ltd. for 9 years in project finance department before shifting to ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Limited. Currently in Reliance, he focuses on global risk management projects besides handling finance related projects. Mr Agarwal has done his B.Tech in Electronic Enginering from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and His MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. With a rich experience in the field, Mr Agarwal is definitely an extremely efficient officer and one of the best in the country.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/alok-agarwal-a754518

Samir Seksaria

Mr. Samir Seksaria, is the Chief financial officer at Tata Consultancy Services. He has an experience in the IT industry of nearly two decades and he has taken significant financial decisions in the company, TCS. Before this, he was in charge of the Business Finance function for TCS, where was responsible for the financial management of the company’s individual operating units and was also responsible for the corporate financial analytics and planning of the company. Samir began his career in TCS in the year 1999 and spent his initial years in consulting assignments involving regulatory compliance, M&A spin offs, amongst others. In his earlier responsibilities, he has played a key role in the Initial Public Offering of TCS in 2004 and subsequently in various other financial transformation journeys such as simplification, straight through processes, early closures, and improved cash management. Mr. Seksaria is an NMIMS, Mumbai graduate and he also finished his Chartered Accountancy from ICAI, Mumbai.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samir-seksaria-3526244

Srinivasan Vaidyanathan

Mr. Srinivasan Vaidyanathan is currently the Chief Financial Officer at HDFC Bank and is responsible for finance and related processes at the Bank.
Prior to this he was Managing Director – Finance & Deputy Treasurer in the Institutional Clients Group, Citigroup, New York. He joined Citi in 1991 and has held regional and global leadership positions in diverse geographies such as Singapore, Hong Kong, and New York. His expertise in products and processes in the areas related to Retail, Cards, & institutional businesses and corporate functions is exceptional.
During his 27 years of stint in Citi, he has successfully led financial control and processes, passionately building the finance function and driving the business results. He has led financial planning; MIS and analysis; treasury; treasury reporting and analysis; and expense control and management. He has also been recognized with Citi Global Consumer Award for Excellence and Citi Chairman’s Award for Service Excellence. He was also part of the Global Consumer Planning Group.
He is a Commerce graduate from Madras University, Mr. Vaidyanathan has various post graduate degrees. He is a Fellow of India Chartered Accountants and Cost & Management Accountants, Fellow of the UK Association of International Accountants, and a Member of CMA, USA. He has also earned an MBA. He is an All India Rank Holder at the Intermediate and Final level of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/srinivasan-vaidyanathan-10

Nilanjan Roy

Mr. Nilanjan Roy is currently the Chief Financial Officer at Infosys Ltd. Before this, he was the Global Chief Financial Officer of Bharti Airtel Ltd. and was responsible for the financial operations across India and Africa. He has held different leadership positions at Bharti Airtel for the last thirteen years. Before this, he worked with Unilever for nearly 15 years in their global operations across India, Europe, and the USA.
Mr. Roy is undoubtedly an established financial officer, who has extensive and rich global experience including shareholder value creation, ESG and corporate governance, business partnering, mergers and acquisitions, treasury and funding, investor relations, cost management, taxation, financial accounting and reporting. Nilanjan Roy is a student of Commerce from Delhi University, and is also a chartered accountant.

Ritesh Tiwari

Mr. Ritesh Tiwari is the Executive Director, Finance & IT, and Chief Financial Officer of Hindustan Unilever Limited. He is also the Vice President, Finance for Unilever, South Asia. At present, Mr. Tiwari is the VP of Finance – Global Performance management. He’s based out of the UK. He finished his Chart Accountancy from ICAI, and thereafter joined HUL in the year 1999 as a management trainee. Sanjeev Mehta, the Chief managing director of HUL said that Tiwari’s purpose-driven leadership has taken HUL’s business to new heights. Some significant implications by Tiwari such as GST and GSK consumer healthcare have brought transformational changes in the company’s business, he added. For the past two decades, he has led teams both within and outside India at Unilever in the core finance sector and as a business partner to front-end sales, categories and supply chain. His most recent and commendable role has been in the UK as the Vice President, Finance, Global Performance Management for Unilever and CFO for Unilever International, where he is credited with bringing digital transformation, simplification and leading projects with high business impact. Despite the attack of the second wave of Covid, HUL reported profit growth of 12% and underlying growth of 9% in the first quarter of the Financial Year 2022.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ritesh-tiwari-554a7263

Sandeep Jain

Mr. Sandeep Jain is the Chief Financial Officer at Bajaj Finance Limited and a key member of its executive management team.
He joined Bajaj Finance in 2008 to set up the management accounting practices, and over the years, he has played an integral role in the growth and evolution of the Company. During his tenure he has involved across various roles such as Strategic Planning, CEO’s Office, Financial Planning & Analysis and also headed the Business Re-engineering and Investor Relations functions of the organization. In Bajaj Auto Limited, he started his professional journey in the Internal Audit function handling audits in the areas of materials, system, finance, and indirect taxation.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandeep-jain-80141317/?originalSubdomain=in

Jaimin Bhatt

Mr. Jaimin Bhatt is the Chief financial officer as well as the president of Kotak Mahindra Bank. He is the head of the Centre division as well as the Support Division at Kotak Mahindra Bank. His work involves finance, tax, strategy, secretarial, Internal Audit, Management Accounts, legal and compliance. Mr. Bhatt joined Kotak Mahindra finance in the year 1995 in the proprietary investment section.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/jaimin-bhatt-015a7712

Jatin Dalal

Mr. Jatin Dalal is Chief Financial Officer for Wipro Limited. He joined Wipro in 2002 and since then he has held various roles in finance and leadership. He led the development of Wipro’s internal Shared Services division (2002-2005) and helped win the coveted Institutional Investor Award for Best IR function in India during his time in corporate treasury (2005-2008). He relocated to the UK in 2009 as the head of finance for Europe and global finance head for three business units: energy and utilities, healthcare, and manufacturing. Immediately prior to his current role, he served as CFO of Wipro’s Global IT Business (2011-2015).
He is a qualified chartered accountant (India), cost and management account (India), chartered global management accountant (UK), and a chartered financial analyst. He holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from National Institute of Technology (NIT), Surat, India and a Postgraduate Diploma in Business Administration (PGDBA) with a specialization in finance and international business from NMIMS, Mumbai, India.
He is on the NYSE Listed Company Advisory Board at New York Stock Exchange. He is also on various committees of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII). He is a trustee for Wipro Foundation.

LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/jatin-dalal-3548943

Soumen Ray

Mr. Soumen Ray is the new CFO of Bharti Airtel. He is an extremely efficient Chartered Accountant with an experience of more than twenty three years in in financial planning, management accounting, factory commercial, treasury and corporate accounts. Before joining Bharti Airtel, he was the CFO of Bajaj Auto Ltd. He has been associated with the company since 2018, and has worked in the taxation, finance and treasury sectors. Prior to this he has also worked for Viacom, Hindustan Unilever, ITC, Eveready Industries and Airtel etc. where he has held senior positions.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/soumen-ray-61142499

Prateek Aggarwal

Mr. Prateek Aggarwal is the Chief Financial Officer at HCL Technologies Ltd. He is a business-focused finance professional with over 30 years of experience, driving strategic initiatives (both organic and inorganic), financial planning and analysis, business finance and contracting, controllership, investor relations, treasury, insurance, global taxation, and legal and compliance. He also has experience in operations, having managed factories and distribution chains, apart from setting up and running shared services. Prior to this Mr. Aggarwal served as the Chief Financial Officer at Hexaware Technologies, Global CFO at AB Minacs Pvt Ltd, and Vice President at Genpact. He has also been associated with Hindustan Unilever Limited for a tenure of 11 years.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/prateekaggarwal

Supratim Dutta

Mr. Supratim Dutta is the Chief Financial Officer of ITC Ltd. Before this, he held the position of Corporate Financial Controller of the Company responsible for Accounts, Taxation and finance operations and prior to that, he was Executive Vice President – Corporate Finance in charge of the Corporate Treasury, Strategic Planning and Corporate Planning functions of the Company.
He joined the Company in November 1990 soon after qualifying as a Chartered Accountant and Cost Accountant. He has wide ranging experience in the Company for nearly 30 years, spanning various senior roles in business finance operations and corporate. He has handled all aspects of finance including Planning, Treasury, M&A, Accounting, Taxation, IT, Investor Relations and business strategy. He has also held important positions in various industry bodies including Chairperson – Finance and Banking Committee of the Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/supratim-dutta-b74a1776

Ajay Seth

Mr. Ajay Seth, is the Chief financial officer of Maruti Suzuki. Mr. Ajay is a graduate from Institute of Chartered Accountants in India. He is an experienced professional whose work is appreciated by all, in the financial sector. Prior to this he was the CFO at Escorts Limited till 2005.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajay-seth-21b1a7a

Niladri Deb

Mr. Niladri Deb is the Chief Financial Officer at Avenue Supermarts Ltd based in India. He has an extensive experience in financial management covering Retail, Manufacturing, Trade Finance, Controllership and IT, Financial Planning, Treasury and Corporate Tax.
Mr. Deb prior to joining Avenue Supermarts was the CFO and MD at The Kraft Heinz Company.
He has also been associated with ITC Limited as the Assistant Commercial Manager and as Assistant Manager at Usha International.

LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/niladri-deb-9306bb7

R. Shankar Raman

Mr. R. Shankar Raman is the Chief Financial Officer at Larsen & Toubro Limited
He is a qualified Chartered Accountant and a Cost Accountant. Over the past 35 years, Mr. Shankar Raman has worked for leading listed corporates in varied capacities in the field of finance.
Mr. Shankar Raman joined L&T Group in 1994 to set up L&T Finance Limited, a wholly owned Subsidiary.
Over the years, Mr. Shankar Raman assumed responsibilities to oversee the entire finance function at the Group level including functions like Risk Management and Investor Relations. Mr. Shankar Raman was appointed as Chief Financial Officer of Larsen & Toubro Limited in September 2011 and subsequently elevated to the Board on October 1, 2011.
Mr. Shankar Raman has been a recipient of several awards such as Best CFO of Asia in the Industrial Sector in a survey conducted by the prestigious New York based Institutional Investor Magazine, winner of Best CFO Awards from CNBC TV18, Financial Express, Business Today and Yes Bank.
Mr. Shankar Raman was the Chairman of the CII’s National Committee of CFOs in 2017-18.  He was also a member of Uday Kotak’s Committee on Corporate Governance constituted by SEBI.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/shankar-raman-2193808

Atul Daga

Mr. Atul Daga is currently serving as the Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer at UltraTech Cement Ltd and Chief Financial Officer at Aditya Birla Retail.
He is also a panel member of Brand Capital’s Scaleup program to mentor entrepreneurs. He was a member of the CII Committee on Retail for 2014 and also the member of the CFO committee of Retailers Association of India.
He has also been accredited with the Chairman’s award for “Exceptional Contributor” 2009, at the Aditya Birla Group.

LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/atul-daga

S. Sreenivasan

S.Srinivasan has been the CFO of Bajaj Finserv since September 2011. His tasks include overseeing the insurance business, having interactions with management on strategic and government issues, annual operating plans and long-range planning, insurance operation result reviews, managing Bajaj Allianz Financial Distributors Limited operations, maintaining investor relations and being a member of the Investment Committee and Risk Committee. 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/s-sreenivasan-548460118/

Shobinder Duggal

Mr. Shobinder Duggal is the Director of Finance and Control and the CFO of Nestle, India. He has a working experience of nearly 35 years with Nestle, both in India and Switzerland. Before becoming the CFO and a board member of Nestle in 2004, he handled various corporate responsibilities such as VP corporate control, heading the internal audit, consolidation & Reporting to the Group and for India entity  handling important assignments at the Nestle group headquarters in Switzerland, Assisting on Investor Relations; Insurance; Controlling; Costing; Overseeing the Treasury function; Payroll; Fixed Assets Management; Operational & Financial audits. Between May 2004 and February 2020, he was the CFO of the South Asian region of Nestle and has also handled various IS and IT responsibilities. Mr. Duggal is the Chairman of the Risk Management Committee and also member of the Stakeholders Relationship Committee of Nestlé India Limited. Besides, he is also on the Board of Nestlé Lanka PLC since January 2014. He is a student of Economics from St Stephen’s College, University of Delhi and a student of ICAI, Mumbai. He also attended a programme for Executive Development from IMD Lausanne, Switzerland. Other than that, he has also been a part of several international courses from Nestle training Centre, Lausanne and Switzerland and London Business School, UK. He really is one of the best we have in the industry.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/shobinder-duggal-281652238?trk=public_profile_browsemap

Seshagiri Rao M.V.S.

Mr. Seshagiri Rao M.V.S. is the Joint Managing Director & Group CFO at JSW Steel Ltd.
He is responsible for overall operations of JSW Steel including Strategy formulations related to business development, expansion of existing businesses, joint ventures, mergers and acquisitions and Cost management. He joined JSW Group in 1997 as Chief Financial Officer. He has been actively involved in all strategic decision making within the group. Prior to joining JSW Steel he has worked with various reputed organizations in various capacities. Mr.Rao is a member of the Institute of Cost and Works Accountants of India and a licentiate member of the Institute of Company Secretaries of India. He is also a Certified Associate of the Indian Institute of Bankers and a diploma holder in Business Finance awarded by the Institute of Chartered Financial Analysts of India.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seshagiri-rao-mvs-a8167445/?originalSubdomain=in

C S Muralidharan

Mr. C.S Muralidharan is the Chief Financial Officer of Sun Pharmaceuticals Industries Pvt ltd.
Mr. Muralidharan is well-known for his excellent service in providing operational and financial leadership. After finishing his higher secondary in Commerce at DTEA Secondary School, he graduated from ICAI. He also attended an executive development program from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Mr Muralidharan expertises in Global Compliance, Capital restructuring and mergers and acquisitions. After remaining the country head of the company named Allergan in Mumbai for nearly nine years, he joined Teva Pharmaceuticals where he remained the Group chief financial officer for a year. After that, he joined Sun Pharma in the year 2017, and is still the group chief financial officer there. 
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/c-s-muralidharan

Manish Saxena

Manish Saxena is the Chief Financial Officer at Adani Enterprises Limited – Natural Resources.
Mr. Saxena has 30 years of well-diversified experience in Operating and Strategic Finance, and Taxation across various sectors such as the manufacturing sector as well as the service sector.
He has worked in Telecom Industry for more than 13 years. Prior to this he has served as the Chief Financial Officer at Great Eastern Energy Corporation Ltd., Finance Controller and Vice President at Aircel, and has been associated with various other big companies in India like ICI India Limited, Bharti Airtel, Ballarpur Industries Limited, Reliance Communications and abroad.
He also believes in the grooming of talent. He has attended various leadership and focused training programs in Risk Management, Coaching, Analytical Skills, Train the Trainer on ISO 9000 Certification, and Economic Value Add.
LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/manish-saxena-118a45b
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