Hm, good catch. I found their website but missed that piece. I see he presented his plea before the Indian court from the USA via video link. I was picturing him operating out of India. If he's in an academic setting in the USA, he's no doubt being influenced by American leftists who will of course have the standard leftist axe to grind against HCQ.
More so than that these academic researchers very often have consulting gigs with Pharma and tend to be financially invested in them too. In any medical paper they publish - and they publish often (which is how they get their research funding), on the topic of a drug or a clinical trial involving that drug, they are required to give full disclosure on their ties to the manufacturer of that drug. In this case all you have to do is a Google search on anything this researcher published and check for disclosures.