BharatPe co-founder Ashneer Grover’s lawyer apologised in court today on his client’s behalf for a post on X (formerly Twitter) last week that divulged confidential information about the fintech unicorn’s Series E round.
Grover’s lawyer also gave an undertaking that the BharatPe co-founder won’t do such a thing in future while arguing that he needs to retain access to the information to be able to fight in several cases brought against him by the unicorn.
This happened as BharatPe filed a fresh case on November 23 asking the court to restrict Ashneer Grover from publishing or disclosing confidential information about the company as he continues to be bound by confidentiality obligations under his employment agreement.
The employment agreement provides for arbitration in case of dispute and this was an ad interim injunction application for immediate relief to protect the company’s confidential information (in this case internal emails and extracts of board meetings).
The Delhi High Court accepted the apology and undertaking offered by Grover. It noted that the embattled founder is bound by his obligations under the employment agreement to keep all information he has confidential and also return it to the company.
The tweet in question has now been deleted and was posted by Grover after his wife and he was stopped from flying to New York on the basis of a lookout circular issued by the Economic Offences Wing of Delhi Police.
Last year, BharatPe had filed a criminal complaint with the Economic Offences Wing on 17 counts, including embezzlement, forgery and criminal breach of trust, which could land the Grovers in jail for up to 10 years if proven guilty.
According to a suit brought by BharatPe, Grover's wife Madhuri Jain approved payments totalling Rs 7.6 crore to eight such vendors, who did not assist the company in recruiting any employees.
Former BharatPe CEO Suhail Sameer, for example, was shown to have been hired through a human resources (HR) vendor named Vikas Enterprises, despite being hired directly by the company.
Moreover, the company claims that Jain and her family members not only connived to carry out these fraudulent transactions on recruitment services but that these eight vendors also had close ties to them and to each other.
The fintech unicorn also filed a civil suit against Ashneer Grover, his wife Madhuri Jain, and other family members, seeking over Rs 88 crore in damages for alleged misappropriation of funds.
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