Cafe Coffee Day founder VG Siddhartha goes missing! 10 things we know so about this tragic case

Indian cafe chain, Cafe Coffee Day (CCD) founder-owner, VG Siddhartha has gone missing! According to the Karnataka police, VG Siddhartha is believed to have committed suicide, IANS reported. Siddhartha was recently in the news after selling his 20% stake in one of India's top tech companies, Mindtree. This had led to Larsen and Toubro taking over the IT major against the wishes of the old management. The deal for sale of Mindtree shares to Larsen and Toubro was worth Rs 3,269 crore.

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Notably, Income-Tax department had conducted raids on VG Siddhartha companies and uncovered some Rs 650 cr worth of unaccounted funds. Here is what we know so far about Cafe Coffee Day founder VG Siddhartha after he went missing in Mangaluru:

1. VG Siddhartha was last seen near Netravati river in Mangaluru talking on the phone.

2. Siddhartha has been reported missing from Jappinamogaru, which is very close to Netravathi river and just two to three kilometres from the sea.

3. The police have launched a search operation in the river to trace him in the Ullal area of Mangaluru. They are using inflatable boats to search the area.

4. Siddhartha is the son-in-law of the former Karnataka chief minister and Maharashtra Governor S M Krishna.

5. Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa and Congress leaders D K Shivakumar and B L Shankar arrived at the Bengaluru residence of SM Krishna early this morning.

6. Local MLA and Congress leader U T Abdul Khader, too, joined in the search operation on Tuesday morning."We are very concerned that our friend, a very good person and someone who has given jobs to thousands of people is missing since yesterday night," ANI quoted Khader as saying. 

7. Cafe Coffe Day chain has as many as 1,750 outlets and over 60,000 vending machines installed in India and abroad.

8. Mangaluru Police Commissioner Sandeep Patil revealed, "Siddhartha is suspected to have jumped into the Nethravathi river near Mangaluru from the bridge though his body has not been traced so far despite massive search operation".

9. The tragic event started unfolding after Siddhartha`s driver Basavaraj Patil filed a complaint in a Mangaluru police station that his employer was missing from the bridge over the river where he got down from his car and wanted to take a walk. 

10. Patil complaint read, "Siddhartha got down from the car on the bridge across the river and asked him (driver) to wait at the other end of it as he wanted to walk for a while but did not turn up even an hour later".

Full Text of VG Siddhartha letter to Board and Employees

VG Siddhartha

"To our Board of Directors and Coffee Day family,

After 37 years, with strong commitment to hard work, having directly clearly 30,000 jobs in our companies and their subsidiaries, as well as another 20,000 jobs in technology companies where I have been a large shareholder since its founding, I have failed to create the write profitable business model despite my best efforts. 

I would like to say I gave it my all. I am very sorry to let down all the people that put their trust in me. I fought for a long time but today I gave up as i couldn't take any more pressure from one of the private equity partners forcing me to buyback shares, a transaction I had partially completed six months ago by borrowing a large sum of money from a friend. Tremendous pressure from other vendors let to me succumbing to the situation. There was a lot of harassment from the previous DG Income Tax in the form of attache our shares on two separate occasions to block our Mindtree deal and then taking position of our Coffee Day shares, although the revised returns have been filed by us. This was very unfair and has lead to the serious liquidity crunch. 

I sincerely request each of you to be strong into continue running these businesses with new management. I am solely responsible for all mistakes. Every financial transaction is my responsibility. My team, auditors and senior management are totally unaware of all my transactions. The law should hold me and only me accountable, as I have withheld this information from everybody including my family. 

My intention was never to cheat or mislead anybody, I have failed as an entrepreneur. This is my sincere submission, I hope someday you will understand, forgive and pardon me. 

I have enclosed a list of our assets and tentative value of each assets. As seen below, our assets outweigh our liabilities and can help repay everybody." 

(Zee Business does not vouch for the veracity of this purported letter written by VG Siddhartha)