New Delhi: Putting behind the controversy around its co-founder Ashneer Grover, fintech startup BharatPe has posted record growth in the fiscal year ended March 31 and is on track to break even and list on stock exchanges in the next 18-24 months, its CEO Suhail Sameer said.

In an interview with news agency PTI, he said while the board will take a call on what to do with the money allegedly defrauded by Grover, his priority is the firm's employees so that they stay focused and teams remain stable.

"Second focus is to keep firing on the business front. From a long-term point of view, that's all that will matter for me, for my teams. I am just doubling down on these things," he said.

And that focus has paid off well.

"Business in the last quarter (January-March) is up 20 percent on every metric -- transactions, TPV, loans facilitated, and revenue. And this is despite January being (hit by) COVID and everything was slowing a bit. Delhi was shut, many cities had weekend curfews," he said.

BharatPe, which allows shop owners to make digital payments through QR codes, is now in 225 cities (more than 2x growth from last fiscal) and has over 8 million merchants on board (up from 5 million in FY21 that ended on March 31, 2021).