BharatPe co-founder on leave: Digital payments firm BharatPe, in a statement issued on Wednesday, January 19, announced that the company’s co-founder and managing director Ashneer Grover will take a voluntary leave till the end of March. Grover’s decision comes after he faced criticism over a leaked audio clip that purportedly saw him using derogatory language against an employee of Kotak Group. The company issued its statement the day after receiving the request from the managing director, he mentioned in his statement. The fintech firm said the operations that Grover oversaw will be handled by CEO Suhail Sameer.
“Our co-founder and MD Ashneer Grover has informed the board today”
Regarding its decision to take voluntary leave from BharatPe till the end of March,” BharatPe mentioned in its statement issued that day.
“Ashneer has co-created BharatPe from the beginning and his decision is in line with his passionate commitment to the company’s future success,” it added.
The company said that at present its board has accepted Grover’s decision. “For now, the Board has accepted Ashneer’s decision, which we believe is in the best interests of the company, our employees and investors, and the millions of traders we support every day,” it said.
BharatPe further said in its media statement, “BharatPe will continue to be led by our CEO Suhail Sameer and our strong management team.”
Ashneer Grover’s decision comes after a controversy when an audio clip featuring his voice was leaked. In the purported clip, Grover was heard abusing and threatening a Kotak Group employee for not booking shares during the initial public offering (IPO) of FSN E-commerce Ventures. FSN E-commerce Ventures, which operates online beauty and fashion platform Nykaa, saw bumper listings in the stock market and was touted as one of the most successful IPOs of 2021.
However, Grover soon shared a statement on Twitter claiming that the audio clip was fake, adding that it was the work of a scammer. However, he later deleted that post. “Friends. Cold! This is a fake audio of some scammer trying to extort money (US$240K in bitcoin). I refuse to budge. I have more character. And the internet has got enough scammers,” He had tweeted soon after the clip went viral on social media.
According to a report in Moneycontrol.com, Grover had subsequently sent a legal notice to Kotak Group for “failure to provide IPO financing for Nayaka IPO”.
“The notice has sought damages of Rs 500 crore for subscription of shares in the company besides Rs 1 lakh towards the cost of legal notice, and for the profit made to Grover and his wife,” the Moneycontrol report said.
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