India’s Ministry of Corporate Affairs has asked Byju’s to explain why it hasn’t filed its audited financials for the year ending March 2021, Bloomberg News reported Thursday.
Edtech giant Byju’s, which is India’s most valuable startup with a valuation of $22 billion, has missed the deadline to file its audited results by 17 months.
The startup – backed by scores of high-profile investors including Blackrock, Tiger Global, UBS, Prosus Ventures, Sequoia India and Lightspeed Venture Partners – said in early July that it will file the results within 10 days. It has since repeatedly missed its own deadline.
The Ministry of Corporate Affairs’ inquiry follows Indian lawmaker Karti Chidambaram calling for an investigation into the finances of the firm for not submitting its statements.
Chidambaram, a member of Parliament for Sivaganga in the Lok Sabha, wrote an open letter to the country’s fraud regulator, requesting they open an investigation into the finances of Byju’s, which as he pointed has yet to secure $250 million capital from its most recent funding round unveiled in March and has fired hundreds of employees and is in parallel looking to acquire an American firm at a valuation of over $2 billion.
The company didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Byju’s has also been in the market to raise a new round for over four months but has had no little to no success, according to a source directly familiar with the matter.