Vijay Shekhar Sharma steps down as Paytm Payment Bank Chairman

Vijay Shekhar Sharma, the founder of Paytm, has stepped down as the Non-Executive Chairman of Paytm Payments Bank as part of an overhaul of the bank's board in response to regulatory concerns.
This move aims to facilitate the transition for the payments bank. One97 Communications Ltd, the parent company of Paytm, made this announcement in a regulatory filing.
The decision comes in the wake of regulatory actions taken by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), including prohibiting Paytm Payments Bank from accepting customer deposits after February 29 due to repeated non-compliance with regulations. This deadline was later extended to March 15.
In light of these developments, Paytm Payments Bank has initiated several measures, including appointing new members to its board. These include Srinivasan Sridhar, a former chairman of the Central Bank of India, retired civil servants Debendranath Sarangi and Rajni Sekhri Sibal, and Ashok Kumar Garg, a former executive director of Bank of Baroda, as independent directors.
Previously, independent director Manju Agarwal, a former executive of the State Bank of India, resigned from the board citing personal commitments, shortly after RBI's crackdown on the payments bank.
Surinder Chawla, a former executive of RBL Bank, currently serves as the managing director and chief executive of Paytm Payments Bank. Chawla expressed confidence in the expertise of the new board members, highlighting their role in enhancing the bank's governance and operational standards.
Additionally, One97 Communications formed a group advisory committee chaired by M. Damodaran, a former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, to address regulatory concerns.
Recently, the RBI instructed the National Payments Corporation of India to review Paytm's request to become a third-party application provider for Unified Payments Interface (UPI) payments on the Paytm app.