About
Jayant Sinha has been India’s minister of civil aviation since 2016, following a two-year stint as the country’s finance minister. Before entering politics in 2014, Sinha was a management consultant and an investment fund manager. He also worked as the managing director in India for Omidyar Network, a philanthropic investment firm founded by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, an American billionaire who is also a donor to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.In the data
In 2010, acting as an Omidyar Network representative, Sinha was appointed to the board of directors of D.Light Design, a Californian solar power company that received $5.5 million from the philanthropic investment firm and other investors.
In a company document dated December 2012, Sinha appears as one of the signatories of a board resolution approving a $3 million loan from a Dutch fund to D.Light’s Cayman subsidiary.
In his 2016 declaration to the Indian prime minister’s office it is noted that he “may be entitled to carried interest in certain investments made by Omidyar Network entities in the years 2009 to 2013,” and that the value of the carried interest he may receive “is not capable of determination.” Sinha doesn’t currently have any business interests, according to the declaration.
Response
Sinha said that he was on the board of D.Light Design until 2014 and signed financial documents as part of his duty. During his last year on the board he was an independent director and received consulting fees and D.Light shares that he has disclosed, he said.
The “investments made by the Omidyar Network entities” that are mentioned in his 2016 declaration have not provided him monetary benefits in the last three years since he entered politics, Sinha told ICIJ’s media partner The Indian Express.
