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[Rhea Thomas]

Last year, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ruffled quite a few feathers when he commented on soaring executive salaries and said the rich must give back to the society and not show off wealth.

Some in corporate India took umbrage to those remarks and justified their salaries. The jury is still out on whether huge CEO compensation leads to better company performance.

However, in private sector companies in India, CEO compensation is impressively high. By contrast, public sector bosses get a pittance: in some cases, not even one per cent of what the top private sector CEOs get.

So who are India's highest paid CEOs? Here's a list. . .

[Rhea Thomas]

Mukesh Ambani

No prizes for guessing who the highest earning CEO in India is. When it comes to earning money, Mukesh Ambani is way ahead of not only his younger brother Anil, but the top brasses of entire India Inc.

With a package of Rs 24.51 crore (Rs 245.10 million), Mukesh takes home over ten times the annual remuneration of his brother Anil -- with whom he parted ways over two years ago.

In the last fiscal ended March 2007, Mukesh Ambani took home a total Rs 24.51 crore as chairman and managing director of RIL -- which is the highest among more than 10,000 top executives and directors at about 1,200 companies that have disclosed so far their annual remuneration figures for the year.

When the brothers were together, they got a package of Rs 21.9 crore (Rs 219 million) each at Reliance Industries in the financial year 2004-05, according to information available in the company's annual report.

[Rhea Thomas]

Kalanidhi Maran & Kavery Kalanidhi

Sun TV chairman and managing director Kalanidhi Maran and joint managing director Kavery Kalanidhi, whose annual remuneration stood at Rs 23.26 crore (Rs 232.6 million) each in 2006-07.

[Rhea Thomas]

Sunil Bharti Mittal

Bharti Airtel's chairman and managing director Sunil Bharti Mittal ranks fourth with an annual pay packet of close to Rs 15 crore (Rs 150 million).

[Rhea Thomas]

K Anji Reddy

Dr Reddy's Laboratories executive chairman K Anji Reddy is the fifth highest paid executive in India with an annual compensation package of Rs 14.4 crore (Rs 144 million).

[Rhea Thomas]

Brijmohan Lal Munjal & Pawan Munjal

Hero Honda's chairman Brijmohan Lal Munjal and the company's managing director and chief executive Pawan Munjal are ranked sixth and seventh with annual salaries of Rs 13.99 crore (Rs 139.9 million) and Rs 13.88 crore (Rs 138.8 million) each.