Update, November 14: Binny Bansal’s resignation was a result of an investigation against him looking into an allegation of sexual assault from a few years ago, according to Reuters. The report cites an anonymous source familiar with the matter as saying that the individual concerned was a former Flipkart associate who was not with the company at the time of making the allegation, but that the allegation was brought to Flipkart’s notice in July. A Moneycontrol report cites an anonymous source as saying that the development was related to a complaint from a female colleague a few months ago. In its statement announcing the resignation, Walmart didnot specified the nature of allegations of “personal misconduct” made against Bansal.
**
Earlier, November 13: Binny Bansal has resigned from Flipkart as group CEO after Flipkart and Walmart conducted an independent investigation into allegations of personal misconduct against Bansal. A statement by Walmart says Bansal “strongly denies” the allegation.
We have reached out to Bansal and Flipkart for comment, and will update this when we hear from them.
The Walmart statement says: “While the allegation did not find evidence to corroborate the complainant’s assertions against Binny, it did reveal other lapses in judgment, particularly a lack of transparency, related to how Binny responded to the situation. Because of this, we have accepted his decision to resign.”
As of now, it is unclear what the nature of these allegations against Bansal are.
The statement added that Bansal had been looking to “transition” for a while, and this development has just accelerated the process. Meanwhile, Kalyan Krishnamurthy will continue as Flipkart CEO. Ananth Narayanan will continue as Myntra and Jabong CEO, Sameer Nigam will continue as CEO of PhonePe. Both Nigam and Krishnamurthy will report to the board, says the statement.
