Mumbai, Jan. 17: Tata Motors today became the first listed company of the $103.5-billion salt-to-steel group to appoint N. Chandrasekaran as its chairman.

In a regulatory filing, the company said "the board of directors have today appointed Natarajan Chandrasekaran as additional director and chairman of the board with immediate effect".

The appointment comes within a week of group holding company Tata Sons announcing Chandrasekaran as its executive chairman, after two months of a bitter boardroom battle that followed the removal of Cyrus Mistry in October.

Popularly known as Chandra, the 53-year-old will take charge at Tata Sons, the main holding company of the group, from February 21.

It is expected that over the coming days, a few of the other listed Tata group companies will also make similar announcements.

Tata Motors said in its announcement that the board of directors has also appointed Chandrasekaran as additional director.

Chandrasekaran, the chief executive of TCS since 2009, had overseen a three-time growth in profit and topline at the country's largest software exporter.

At Tata Motors, he will have to take the responsibility of turning around the auto major which is trying to regain lost ground, specially in the passenger vehicles segment.

Chandrasekaran will also have to pay special attention to the Nano. Mistry had alleged that Tata Motors had been unable to discontinue the manufacture of the loss-making small car because of "emotional reasons" and doing so would also stop the supply of "gliders" to an entity that makes electric cars in which Ratan Tata has a stake.

Mistry had alleged that the Nano product development called for a car below Rs 1 lakh but the cost was always above this. "This product has consistently lost money, peaking at Rs 1,000 crore," Mistry said in his letter written to Tata Sons board members.

At present, Tata Motors is focusing on reviving its fortunes in the passenger vehicles segment with its compact hatchback Tiago, receiving good response from the market.

In December, passenger vehicles of the company recorded sales of 10,827 units in the domestic market which amounted to a growth of 35 per cent over last year. Here, the passenger car sales showed 40 per cent growth, led by the Tiago.

The company will launch its premium SUV Hexa tomorrow.