nalin negi bharatpe: Whenever we see a line being breached, we will go back to court: BharatPe’s stand-in CEO Nalin Negi

Addressing the opprobrium BharatPe has copped on social media from its embattled former managing director (MD) and cofounder Ashneer Grover, and former head of controls Madhuri Jain (Grover’s wife), the fintech’s interim chief Nalin Negi said that it will let “lawyers deal with the situation”, while the management focuses on “building the business”.

This is the first time that Negi has commented on the issue.

Negi’s comments also come at a time when BharatPe’s parent, Resilient Innovations, has filed a fresh case in the Delhi High Court seeking an injunction against Grover to prevent him from divulging “confidential information” related to the company. Grover’s counsel apologised for the fintech cofounder’s conduct last week during the hearing. Subsequently, the Delhi High Court said that it was appalled by Grover’s conduct and imposed a fine of Rs 2 lakh on him.

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“We have gone and filed cases. It is more to do with lawyers dealing with the situation rather than management trying to address it. We, as a management, are focused on doing what we know best, and will let the lawyers figure out what they know best,” Negi said. “We are pretty confident of the legal system and whenever we see a line being breached, we go back to the court.”

BharatPe’s fresh case is in addition to a civil suit it has filed in the Delhi High Court against Grover and his family members, seeking up to Rs 88.67 crore in damages for alleged embezzlement of funds.

The fintech has also filed a complaint with the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police accusing Grover of fraud, and approached the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) to claw back the cofounder’s restricted shareholding. Even in the civil suit, the two parties have been at loggerheads over Grover’s social media activity, with BharatPe seeking an injunction citing the use of “unparliamentary language” against the company in his posts.

“The court cases and complaints are going on and we are happy with the progress there. For us, the focus is only on building the business. And yes, you hear this tweet and that tweet, but after a period of time our partners and the people we deal with have understood that this is just noise,” Negi added.

Negi added that BharatPe has gone ahead to acquire a majority stake in new-age NBFC Trillion Loans, and procured online application authorisation for a payment aggregator licence, despite receiving continuous criticism from Grover.

In May, Grover, in a LinkedIn post, said that BharatPe has no business left and would end up in a situation like Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) in the US. He alleged that the company would be sold in a fire sale overnight.

Last week, Grover also appeared before the Delhi Police EOW for questioning in the alleged fraud case.

In a status report on its investigation, filed in the high court, the EOW said that at least eight human resource consultancy firms hired by BharatPe had links to relatives of Jain, Grover’s wife.

Last week, Grover and his wife were stopped at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport on the basis of a lookout circular issued against them.

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