The January-February 2013 edition of the Harvard Business Review (HBR) has granted ITC Ltd chairman Y C Deveshwar the seventh rank in the list of the world's best performing chief executive officers (CEOs).

The list of "100 Best Performing CEOs in the World," released on Sunday, also showed that Mr. Deveshwar grabbed the first rank among the Indian CEOs.

The HBR put a spotlight on the top CEOs of the world who have created long-term value for their companies.

Commenting on the review, ITC said, "The 2013 global HBR CEO Scorecard looked at how much total shareholder returns had changed over a time period from the CEO's 1st day in office to 31st August 2012, as well as the overall increase in market capitalization."

Introduced by Harvard Business Review in 2010, this evaluation endeavors to implement a scorecard that let shareholders to know CEOs' long-term performance. ITC has been delivering a shareholder return of nearly 26 per cent for the past 15 years.

Mr. Deveshwar earned this global recognition for transforming ITC from a just a cigarette company into one of the top diversified multi-business Indian conglomerates.

Mr. Deveshwar became the chairman and chief executive of ITC group in 1996.