diff --git a/MAINTAINERS b/MAINTAINERS
index 1aabf1c15bb30..d83955306deb5 100644
--- a/MAINTAINERS
+++ b/MAINTAINERS
@@ -5240,6 +5240,7 @@ R:	Paulo Alcantara <pc@manguebit.com> (DFS, global name space)
 R:	Ronnie Sahlberg <ronniesahlberg@gmail.com> (directory leases, sparse files)
 R:	Shyam Prasad N <sprasad@microsoft.com> (multichannel)
 R:	Tom Talpey <tom@talpey.com> (RDMA, smbdirect)
+R:	Bharath SM <bharathsm@microsoft.com> (deferred close, directory leases)
 L:	linux-cifs@vger.kernel.org
 L:	samba-technical@lists.samba.org (moderated for non-subscribers)
 S:	Supported