Delhi HC grants additional time to Ashneer Grover, wife to file response in BharatPe legal suit

A written statement is expected to be filed in response to the main suit as well, a single-judge bench of Justice Navin Chawla ruled.

At the last hearing on December 8, the Delhi High Court bench had issued summons to the Grovers and granted the couple two weeks to file a reply to the interim relief application.

During the hearing on Monday, BharatPe’s counsel had argued against the comments made by Ashneer Grover with regard to board chairman Rajnish Kumar, as well as against the company.

Grover, in a series of tweets in December, claimed that hiring Kumar was his biggest mistake and that the shares of State Bank of India had tanked under his chairmanship.

The New Delhi-based company has sought Rs 88 crore in damages for alleged misappropriation of its funds and reputational harm. Grover, Jain and her brother Shwetank Jain, her sister’s husband Deepak Gupta, and her father Suresh Jain, are the five defendants in the suit.

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Grover in a series of tweets in December claimed that hiring Kumar, the former State Bank of India chairman, was his biggest mistake and that the shares of the public sector bank had tanked under him.
BharatPe’s counsel also presented a video clip of a recent altercation between the Grovers and the company board during the company AGM on December 31.

The High Court bench asked Grover’s counsel to advise him against speaking against the company’s professionals and maintain decorum.

With regard to the recent altercation at the BharatPe AGM, Grover’s counsel argued that there was nothing wrong with the defendant (Grover) calling the police if he was being prevented from attending the AGM despite being the “single largest shareholder in the company”.

Last month, BharatPe had filed both civil and criminal suits against the defendants, in addition to a complaint filed with the Economic Offences Wing (EOW).

Later that week, the company also approached the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) seeking to claw back cofounder Ashneer Grover’s restricted shareholding in the company, ET
had reported on December 10.

The high-decibel battle between Grover and BharatPe started after an audio clip of an expletive-laced tirade against a Kotak Mahindra Bank employee, allegedly by Grover, surfaced on social media.

The irate voice in the clip alleged that the lender had refused him financing for a personal investment in omnichannel beauty retailer Nykaa’s Initial Public Offering. Soon after, Grover went on leave following internal whistleblower complaints on alleged financial malpractices and corporate misgovernance at the fintech company.

By the end of January, BharatPe’s board had hired independent auditors Alvarez & Marsal, and PricewaterhouseCoopers to look into the complaints.

Eventually, this led to ouster of Jain from the company with Grover resigning soon after, last March. BharatPe alleged at the time that Grover had tendered his resignation “after receiving the agenda for an upcoming board meeting that included submission of the PwC report regarding his conduct”.