Rajat Gupta quits as Indian School of Business chairman

“Rajat Gupta has requested the ISB executive board to relieve him of his board responsibilities till his pending matter with the US SEC is resolved. This,and the appointment of the new chairman,will be tabled at the upcoming Board meeting on April 2,2011,” ISB said in a statement today.

Gupta,who is the co-founder of ISB,will not attend the upcoming board meeting scheduled for April 2. Corporate observers say Gupta led from the front in making ISB one of the world’s leading business schools. The executive board of the ISB that Gupta led as chairman has top industrialists like Anil Ambani,Adi Godrej,Rahul Bajaj,LN Mittal and Deepak Parekh,among others,as members.

Gupta recently took a leave of absence from New Silk Route Partners,the $1.4 billion private-equity firm he co-founded. He voluntarily took the leave to avoid any distraction and ensure New Silk Route’s continued focus on the execution of its investment strategy,the US-based firm recently said. Gupta is fighting civil charges that he tipped hedge fund billionaire Raj Rajaratnam,the central figure in a sprawling insider trading case,about Warren Buffett’s plans to invest in Goldman Sachs at the height of the financial crisis. Last week,Gupta sued US regulators,saying they are trying to unfairly deprive him of a jury trial.

He recently resigned from three corporate boards,including American Airlines. AMR Corp,the parent company of American Airlines,said that 62-year old Gupta “voluntarily resigned from the boards of directors of AMR Corporation and its subsidiary,American Airlines,effective immediately.

“The ex-director of Goldman Sachs also resigned from the board and as chairman of outsourcing company Genpact Ltd. The IIT,Harvard Business School and MIT alumnus also resigned as director from the board of Connecticut-based electronic systems manufacturer Harman International Industries. Two weeks prior to this,Gupta had resigned as a director of Procter & Gamble.

The SEC had accused Gupta of insider trading,alleging that he passed information to Rajaratnam on companies including Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble.