Karandeep Singh, the Chief Financial Officer of eCommerce firm #flipkart has quit the company, at a time when the company is being investigated by the enforcement directorate for allegedly violating government norms on foreign direct investment in multi brand retailing.
The news surfaced on a Quora thread (Flipkart warehouses raided on 30 nov, whats next?), where an Anon user has commented that “Ed folks spent a lot of time with cfo last week. They also spent long time at the ws retail cubicle inside flipkart warehouse.”
Flipkart spokesperson confirmed the resignation to NextBigWhat and said that Singh quit the company for personal reasons. We asked Flipkart if his resignation has anything to do with the ongoing ED probe, but the company said that his resignation was personal.
Working with Flipkart has been a great opportunity and I am glad to have been able to contribute to the Flipkart growth story. It has been a great learning experience working with a young, dynamic team and while I would have loved to continue my work here, for personal reasons have decided to move on. I wish Team Flipkart the very best!! [Karandeep Singh]
In an e-mail response, Sachin Bansal, Chief Executive officer, Flipkart said that “Singh will be sorely missed at Flipkart. Though we are sorry to see him go – we understand that personal commitments sometimes take precedence and we wish him only the very best in his future endeavors.”
Singh had joined India’s largest online retailer Flipkart in December 2011. The company, hailed as the poster boy of Indian e-commerce, came under government scrutiny last year.
Flipkart & Government investigations
In December 2012, the government had ordered enforcement directorate to investigate Flipkart for alleged violation of norms laid down by the government pertaining to foreign direct investment in multi brand retail.
The government earlier said that it has received references alleging violation of the FDI policy be certain companies including Bharti Wal-Mart/ Cedar Support Services Limited and Flipkart Online Services.
Four months ago, the Indian government had allowed up to 51 % Foreign Direct Investment in multi brand retail. At the time, it seemed like multinational giants like Amazon and Walmart would soon set shop in India. However, the government said that e-commerce companies with FDI are not permissible in India.
As we wrote in an earlier post, e-commerce companies raised millions of dollars from foreign investors and in the absence of clearly articulated government norms specific to e-commerce were in a bit of a grey area.
