BharatPe Founder Accused of ‘Extensive Misappropriation’

The co-founder of Indian FinTech BharatPe resigned from his post this week after his wife, Madhuri Jain Grover, head of controls at the company, was fired and he was accused of stealing from the payments startup.

As The Hindustan Times reported Wednesday (March 2), Ashneer Grover blamed “male chauvinism” for his wife’s firing.

“In the termination letter, they have mentioned about a laser treatment. I can tell you the level of blatant lies they have gone to,” Grover said.

“My wife had a skin condition. She was undergoing a doctor’s treatment and that bill is a private bill. She had paid for it. It was just lying in the drawer. They picked that up and said you claimed this bill from the company. To hell with all of them.”

Read more: Indian Digital Payments Startup BharatPe Raises $350M

Per a TechCrunch report, the company told a different story, issuing a statement Wednesday (March 2) that accused Grover and his family of engaging in “extensive misappropriation of company funds, including, but not limited to, creating fake vendors through which they siphoned money away from the company’s expense account and grossly abused company expense accounts in order to enrich themselves and fund their lavish lifestyles.”

The company continued: “The Board will not allow the deplorable conduct of the Grover family to tarnish BharatPe’s reputation. As a result of his misdeeds, Mr. Grover is no longer an employee, a founder, or a director of the company.”

In a letter to the BharatPe board, Asheer wrote of going from being “the face of Indian entrepreneurship” to now “wasting his time fighting a long, lonely battle against his own investors and management. Unfortunately, in this battle, the management has lost what is actually at stake — BharatPe.”

BharatPe achieved unicorn status — a term for privately held companies valued at more than $1 billion — last year after a $350 million funding round valued the firm at $2.2 billion.