MUMBAI (Reuters) – An independent inquiry has found former top executives of India’s CARE Ratings Ltd not guilty of potential misconduct, the company said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday.
The charges against Rajesh Mokashi, erstwhile managing director and CEO, and S.B. Mainak, former chairman, of interference with the ratings process and influencing the ratings could not be substantiated, the company said.
The ratings agency had appointed a former judge of the top court to conduct an independent inquiry, which submitted its findings to the company’s board on April 11.
Mokashi declined to comment while Mainak could not immediately be reached for comment.
In 2019, the company had sent the executives on leave after an anonymous complaint against the officials was sent to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
Executives of other ratings agencies such as ICRA Ltd, the Indian unit of Moody’s Investors Service, had also come under scrutiny after the collapse in 2018 of the shadow bank behemoth Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS), which sent shockwaves across India’s financial system.
The ratings agencies had given IL&FS ratings that reflected the highest levels of creditworthiness, and the company’s sudden collapse triggered fears about contagion in the financial sector and spooked investors in both the equity and debt markets.
(Reporting by Nupur Anand; Editing by Susan Fenton)
