Walmart Found Out Binny Bansal Was Sexually Involved With The Woman That Accused Him

Many business newspapers have published the story of Binny Bansal (Flipkart's CEO) and a woman who has a voluntary relationship in 2016. This woman previously worked at Flipkart in 2012. But recently in July, this woman accused Binny Bansal of having sexually harassed her.

Walmart contacted a global law firm to clarify the matter and discovered that Binny Bansal was actually involved in the matter. But Walmart claims that Bansal is also at fault for not revealing this.

Flipkart Group CEO and co-founder Binny Bansal

On Thursday, the Economic Times and Bloomberg News published an investigation against Binny Bansal, which began in July. A woman accused Bansal of sexually assaulting her. But the law firm discovered that Binny Bansal and the woman had a voluntary relationship from both sides in 2016. Earlier in 2012, she had been working at a call center under the management and operation of Flipkart. In 2016, the woman stopped working here and has not been a Flipkart employee ever since.

Just one day before Flipkart and Walmart publicly spoke about the incident, Gibson Dunn law firm informed Binny of the investigation, which was on Monday. Bansal resigned when he knew about this investigation.

On Tuesday, Flipkart and Walmart announced the resignation of Binny Bansal which was effective immediately. This is Bansal's own decision due to his personal investigation. Although there wasn't any evidence against Bansal to be found, his resigning decision was approved as it appeared unclear in the way he dealt with the situation.

Walmart and Flipkart had secretly investigated and did not disclose to Bansal until Monday. The law firm that Walmart hired to investigate and search for evidence did not provide any evidence of sexual assault and showed that this is a consensual relationship.

Walmart was angry and disappointed when Binny Bansal did not disclose the incident to them, while Walmart and Flipkart made an effort to investigate this incident.

In May 2018, Walmart bought a 77% stake in Flipkart, an Indian electronics retailer. This allows Walmart to control and manage Flipkart.

After being notified by Walmart lawyers about the investigation, Bansal resigned at 11am the following morning. In a Bansal email to staff at Flipkart, the decision to resign was triggered by personal events that had happened in the past. These events are to accuse his serious misconduct. He added that the allegations made him extremely shocked and strongly denied. Especially the investigation was conducted by a private law firm hired by Walmart and Flipkart, so for him, this was a lack of transparency. For that reason, he made a quick decision to resign.