Ashneer Grover Deletes Defamatory Tweets Against BharatPe

SUMMARY

Grover's counsel, Giriraj Subramanium told the Delhi High Court that they would abide by its previous order

BharatPe’s counsel has agreed to remove the word ‘family’ in an earlier statement accusing Grover and his family of fraud

The fintech giant had moved the application to Delhi HC after Grover posted a series of social media posts criticising the fintech unicorn

Ashneer Grover claimed that he has removed all inflammatory social media posts against the fintech unicorn BharatPe after receiving a court directive to do so.

This came on the back of the Delhi High Court’s direction to both parties to refrain from using defamatory and unparliamentary language against one another, advising the counsels for both parties to inform their clients against the same.

During a hearing on Friday (May 26), Grover’s counsel, Giriraj Subramanium, told the Delhi High Court that they would abide by its previous order, having retracted all the social media posts.

Grover’s counsel further submitted that they have issues with one of the statements made by BharatPe; alleging that Grover and his family have committed fraud, requesting the statement be removed.

BharatPe’s counsel has agreed to remove the word ‘family’ in an earlier statement accusing Grover and his family of fraud.

The fintech unicorn had moved the application earlier this month in Delhi High Court after Grover had posted a series of social media posts criticising BharatPe and its top management.

BharatPe Vs Ashneer Grover

In particular, Rajnish Kumar, the present chairman of the board at the fintech unicorn, has been on Grover’s target for a while. In his memoir Doglapan, Grover claimed that appointing Kumar to BharatPe was his ‘biggest mistake’.

In the now-deleted tweets of May 14 and 15, Grover targeted the ex-SBI chairman, criticising his management style and the FIR registered against him with Delhi Police’s Economic Offences Wing (EOW).

For context, the EOW registered an FIR against Ashneer, his wife Madhuri Jain Grover, and other family members, including Deepak Gupta, Suresh Jain and Shwetank Jain, on May 10 based on a complaint filed by BharatPe.

The fintech unicorn had filed a criminal complaint with the EOW against Grover and his family in December last year, alleging fraud of INR 81.28 Cr.

BharatPe has also filed a civil suit in the Delhi High Court seeking INR 88.67 Cr in damages from Grover, Madhuri Jain Grover and their family members. In addition, it also filed an arbitration suit in the Singapore International Arbitration Centre to get back restricted shares (amounting to a 1.4% stake in BharatPe) allotted to Grover.

Besides BharatPe, Grover is also named in two separate lawsuits from BharatPe cofounders Bhavik Koladiya and Shashvat Nakrani, bringing the three cofounders at war against one another.

Despite all the controversy and court cases, Grover has been busy promoting his new venture, the fantasy cricket app CrickPe, which launched earlier this year. In April, he claimed that the app had recorded 10 Lakh downloads ahead of the IPL season, within a month of its launch.