Shinjini Kumar resigned from PPBL board, attended 2 meets as special guest

This means, two independent members have resigned from the board of the troubled Paytm Payments Bank

Veteran banker Shinjini Kumar, who was on the board of the Paytm Payments Bank since August 2016, had resigned from its board in December but attended two meetings later as special invitee on request, a report by Moneycontrol said on Friday.

Kumar's resignation was effective from February 1. This means two of the independent board members have resigned from the board of the troubled bank. Earlier, Business Standard reported that Manju Agarwal resigned from its board on February 1, 2024, after RBI placed restrictions on the payments bank.

Kumar was the longest-serving member of the bank's board, along with Vijay Shekhar Sharma.

Before Paytm Payments Bank, Kumar had served in Citibank, Pricewaterhouse Coopers India, Bank of America Merrill Lynch (as country compliance head) and the Reserve Bank of India.

The news of resignations came after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) banned Paytm Payments Bank from accepting more deposits starting February 29. On February 8, the RBI said the ban was imposed after "persistent non-compliance" by the company.

Currently, the board of Paytm Payments Bank includes people like Punjab and Sind Bank's AK Jain, former bureaucrat Ramesh Abhishek, and former StanChart and HDFC Bank executive Surinder Chawla.

RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said that the violations were not related to regulations but to compliance. He added that the Know-Your-Customer (KYC) norms were one of the issues, but there were other issues as well.

The RBI will also release an FAQ next week to clarify the doubts of the public as well as the merchants around the issue.