In the initial investigation, recruitment fraud has been detected in BharatPe. This is sure to increase the problems of Bharatpe especially its co-founder Ashneer Grover. The company is already in the news due to a controversy related to Ashneer Grover. This investigation has been done by an outside company. Let us know what is the whole matter.
A report by Alvarez & Marshall (A&M) was submitted to BharatPe’s board on January 24. There are two main grounds for allegations of financial fraud. The first of these is related to the scam related to recruitment. The second is related to payments to vendors who are not actually there. Actually, Madhuri Grover, wife of Ashneer Growth, was handling a big responsibility in the company since the inception of BharatPe. She was the head of the Procurement and Administration Department.
BharatPe used to recruit employees through HR Consultants. For this he used to pay fees to HR consultants. It has been found in the investigation that the company itself used to recruit staff. But for this the fee was paid to many staffing companies, which had nothing to do with this recruitment. It is learned that these companies were linked with each other and had a connection with Madhuri Grover.
A&M has looked into invoices of fees paid to recruitment companies. The employees have confirmed the joining date, which is mentioned in the vendor invoice. However, the employees have denied being recruited through the above mentioned hiring firms. He has also said that he has no information about these firms.
In at least three cases, it has been found that Madhuri Grover took invoices directly from vendors. Then, these were forwarded to the account team for payment. These companies were mostly sole proprietorships. These invoices were prepared by Shwetank Jain, who is Madhuri’s brother. There are many similarities between these recruitment firms. Their email address, physical address, formats, bank branches etc. are same. The most important thing is that all of them are in Panipat. It is also learned that Madhuri is actually a resident of Panipat.
Investigation has found that only two vendors were paid around Rs 4 crore by BharatPe for work which was never done. It has also come to the notice that about Rs 51 crore has been paid to 30 vendors who do not exist. The payments made to these vendors were caught by the Director General of GST Intelligence (DGGI). Instead of challenging the demand for service tax, BharatPe paid arrears of Rs 11 crore along with penalty.
These discrepancies were detected in a DGCI search on October 21, 2021, just 10 days before Ashneer Grover’s legal battle with Kotak Wealth Management began. The DGGI had sent a notice on November 1 to the officer of the company on charges of tax evasion. The company had sent a reply to the notice to DGGI on November 11. This letter had the signature of Deepak Jagadishram. The A&M report said that Gupta, who was responsible for the procurement, is Madhuri’s brother-in-law.
In preliminary investigation, it has been found that the total expenditure associated with 30 vendors was Rs 53.25 crore. A&M has advised BharatPe’s board to conduct a comprehensive investigation. This would explain why the company was making payments to vendors who do not exist.
Read also: Exclusive: Ashneer Grover’s big allegation, said – the board is forcibly kicking me out of BharatPe
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