Ashneer Grover, the co-founder of BharatPe who had got embroiled in a spat with Kotak Mahindra Bank, has proceeded on voluntary leave till March-end.

A statement from the fintech firm on Wednesday said Grover informed the company’s board about his decision to proceed on leave earlier during the day .

“For now, the board has accepted Ashneer’s decision, which we agree is in the best interests of the company, our employees and investors, and the millions of merchants we support each day.’’ .

CEO Suhel Sameer will continue to lead the company, the statement said.

“I plan to take temporary leave of absence from BharatPe till March end. I will return on or before April 1 2022. I will be utilising this period to rejuvenate and refresh myself for our next sprint of value creation. I expect to spend the time thinking more deeply about our next phase of product development, and BharatPe’s path to profitability and IPO,’’ Grover said in a statement, while adding he will “double down on investing in myself personally’’.

Grover was in the news after an audio clip emerged online where he allegedly abused and gave death threat to an employee from Kotak Mahindra Bank as he could not get funding for the IPO of FSN E-Commerce Ventures Ltd which owns the brand Nykaa.

Though Grover tweeted that the audio clip was fake, this was deleted later.

He co-founded BharatPe in 2018.

BharatPe was founded by Grover and Shashvat Nakrani in 2018 and its investors include Tiger Global, Dragoneer Investment group, Sequoia Capital, Steadfast Capital, Ribbit Capital .

Grover was in the news after an audio clip emerged online where he allegedly abused and gave death threat to an employee from Kotak Mahindra Bank as he could not get funding for the IPO of FSN E-Commerce Ventures Ltd which owns the brand Nykaa. Though Grover tweeted that the audio clip was fake, this was deleted later.

Following this, Kotak Mahindra Bank had said that it is pursuing ``legal action’’ against Grover and his wife Madhuri in connection with the alleged abusive call.

While Grover has successfully led BharatPe towards building it as a holistic fintech platform for small merchants, there have been reports which raised questions about his leadership style. Recent reports said that he had a spat with Sequioa India’s managing director Harshjit Sethi.