HDFC Bank’s Sashidhar Jagdishan is the highest-paid bank chief executive in India, followed by the bosses of Axis Bank and ICICI Bank.

Jagdishan, managing director and CEO of HDFC Bank, took home Rs 80 lakh more than Axis Bank head Amitabh Chaudhry in FY23. ICICI Bank CEO Sandeep Bakhshi’s pay pack in the same year was Rs 95 lakh less than Jagdishan’s and Rs 15 lakh less than Chaudhry’s.

Jagdishan grossed over Rs 10.55 crore in overall pay in FY23, with an increase of over 62% than what he took in the year-ago period.

The second-highest paid banker in the country likely was Jagdishan’s colleague Kaizad Bharucha, according to disclosures made in annual reports. The HDFC Bank deputy managing director drew Rs 10.03 crore in FY23. HDFC Bank is India’s largest private sector bank by assets and world’s fourth-largest by market capitalisation as of July 2023.

Among the CEOs, however, Chaudhry was the second highest-paid with a total pay pack of Rs 9.75 crore in FY23.

Bakhshi, CEO of bigger rival ICICI Bank, took home Rs 9.60 crore in the same fiscal year.

Billionaire banker Uday Kotak, who holds over 26% of Kotak Mahindra Bank, took a token Re 1 as remuneration in FY23, which he started in the pandemic year. With the banking industry facing attrition problem, Kotak Mahindra Bank reportedly gave a 16.97% increase in the average remuneration to its staffers excluding the managerial talent.

The employees at ICICI Bank were given an 11% hike, while Axis Bank gave an average hike of 7.6%, As per the annual report of HDFC Bank, the median remuneration of the lender’s employees saw a modest increase of 2.51% in FY23. 

Interestingly, Kochi-headquarterd Federal Bank, which has one of the lowest attrition rates in the industry, reported an average pay hike of only 2.67% in FY23.

When we compare the top management’s median remuneration, Jagdishan topped the list, drawing 150 times the average HDFC Bank employee. He was followed by Bakhshi at 119 times and Chaudhry at 101 times the median salary of staffers at Axis Bank, PTI reported.

Jagdishan's package included a basic salary of Rs 2.82 crore, allowances and perquisites of Rs 3.31 crore, provident fund of Rs 33.92 lakh and a performance bonus of Rs 3.63 crore, its annual report said.

ICICI Bank CEO Bakhshi's overall remuneration was higher by over 35%, while the same for Chaudhry was nearly 28% higher.

It can be noted that there have been cases where RBI has approved the wage revisions for top management for FY22 after the completion of the year, and the remunerations reported in FY23 may include the arrears of the fiscal year gone. The disclosed hikes in remuneration by banks for its key management personnel may be lower.