Executives from Tesco (TSCO.L), the world's No. 3 retailer, could be grilled by a British parliamentary committee of lawmakers over its overstatement of profits, BBC radio reported on Thursday.

Adrian Bailey, chairman of the parliamentary business committee, told BBC Radio 5 Live Tesco executives could be asked to explain the firm's 250 million pounds ($408 million) misstatement of first-half profits which wiped 2 billion pounds off its stock market value.

Bailey said Tesco's overstatement was a "stratospheric error", adding that any probe could be extended to the wider UK grocery industry.

"We may well as a committee want to look at this. Not just at Tesco but at what is going on in the retail industry and in the relationship with the suppliers to see if the issues we came across two years ago are still there," he said.