Siddharth Sharma has been appointed as the new Chief Executive Officer of Tata Trusts, one of India's oldest public charitable foundations, and Aparna Uppaluri has been appointed as the Chief Operating Officer (COO). Tata Trusts, which owns a 66% stake in Tata Sons, said in a statement on Tuesday that both of their appointments will take effect from the next fiscal year, which begins in April. After Tata Group veteran Srinath Narasimhan retired on his superannuation at 60 in October 2022, the foundation's board of trustees was already considering a few internal candidates.
Last month, it was revealed that Siddharth Sharma, Tata Sons group chief sustainability officer (CSO), and Sukaran Singh, CEO of Tata Advanced Systems (TASL), were competing for the position.
Sharma joined the Tata conglomerate in 2019 after serving in the government for two decades. As a bureaucrat, he served in key ministries and government departments such as finance, foreign affairs, and urban development, and he was instrumental in conceptualising and implementing pension reform in India in the form of the National Pension System.
He has also served as a financial advisor to India's 13th and 14th Presidents. In 2012-17, Sharma served as the late President Pranab Mukherjee's financial advisor. He then joined the salt-to-airline conglomerate, where he is in charge of the newly formed sustainability portfolio.