Infosys CEO among highest paid in Indian IT as compensation rose 22% to $9.4 million last fiscal

Infosys CEO Salil Parekh's compensation rose 21.7% to 806.2 million rupees ($9.44 million), the company said in its annual report on Monday, making him one of the highest-paid Indian IT chiefs currently in office.

Parekh, the longest-serving non-founder CEO at the IT company, earned a fixed salary of 79.4 million rupees and bonuses of 231.8 million rupees.

The largest portion, 495 million rupees, resulted from the chief executive of India's No. 2 IT services firm exercising his stock options.

In comparison, Parekh earned $7.9 million in 2024 and $6.76 million in 2023, with the rise in pay, mainly due to a greater number of stock options exercised during the year.

For the financial year 2025, Infosys reported a revenue growth of 4.2% in constant currency terms, falling short of its forecast of 4.5%-5%. For the current fiscal year, it forecast a flat to 3% growth in revenue, signalling a weaker business environment.

India's $283-billion IT sector is facing another year of slowing growth, partly due to the U.S. tariff policies, which complicate forecasting market conditions in key markets and client segments.

"Majority of Infosys revenue is from the U.S. and other global markets. The compensation is in line and consistent with what companies of this scale and size pay globally. Boards of Indian tech companies are indeed aware and need their leaders to be retained and paid appropriately in this challenging environment," said K Sudarshan, managing director at executive search firm EMA Partners.

K Krithivasan, CEO of Infosys' larger rival Tata Consultancy Services earned $3.11 million, and smaller rival Wipro's CEO Srinivas Pallia earned $6.28 million, according to their latest annual report.

Infosys is one of the two among India's top five IT companies that have retained their CEO at the helm over the last 18–24 months, with HCLTech being the other.