Raj Kumar Dhoot has done what no other promoter in telecom sector could do. Following Ravi Sharma’s departure from the company, he has taken over as its chief executive officer (CEO). Traditionally, in telecom sector the promoters including Sunil Mittal, Aditya Birla, Ratan Tata, Siva Sankaran, Mahendra Nahata, Rajiv Mehrotra, Rajiv Chandrashekhar did not assume role of executive head in their companies. All of them had professional CEOs.

Oct 16, 2008 was last day of Ravi Sharma in the office. Therefore, he served a notice period of only three days in the company. Not many CEOs in telecom sector have got this kind of opportunity of getting relieved within three days of submitting resignation letter.

Dhoot has officially taken over the position of CEO today. However, he was interfering in all the important decisions. In Fact, he said that only he would be involved in purchase pf equipment. When the company was negotiating with the vendors for buying equipment, the vendors were surprised to see the promoters in the negotiation table right from the beginning. What was more surprising to them was that the then CEO Ravi Sharma was not present in the meetings. Mahendra Nahata, who owns 36% equity in the company and is considered as telecom Guru, was not even informed of any important decisions.

So Dhoot’s taking over is only a ceremonial decision and will not have any major impact in the functioning of the company, which was first to get licence, appoint a CEO and a CTO and to create a good team, thanks to Mahendra Nahata and Ravi Sharma. However, it has lost all these advantages in last couple of months.