MANGALURU: Billionaire founder-owner of Cafe Coffee Day and the son-in-law of former Chief Minister S M Krishna, V G Siddhartha, is missing after he was last seen on a bridge over the Netravati in Mangaluru on Monday. A massive search operation has been launched to locate him.
A complaint was filed at Kankanadi town police station at 12:30 am on Tuesday. Basavaraj Patil, driver of his Innova was the first person to report the incident to the police. In the complaint he filed, Patil, of Sohrapur taluk of Yadgir district, said Siddhartha left his Bengaluru home for office at 8:00 am on Monday morning. He was back home at 11:00 am. "At 12:30 pm in the afternoon, he asked to take the vehicle to Sakaleshpura. As the car approached this place, he directed me to drive towards Mangaluru."
The complaint further said when the car entered Mangaluru city, Siddhartha instructed the driver to take a deviation towards National Highway - 66 (Panvel-Kochi-Kanyakumari Highway) saying he wanted to pay a visit to his property. "After I drove the car further for three to four kilometres, at a bridge across Netravati River, he asked me to stop the car," Patil alleged in the complaint.
The complainant said at the starting point of the bridge Siddhartha alighted from the car saying he wished to walk towards the end of the 1 km long bridge and asked to park the car at the tail end. The driver did the same. This happened around 6:30 pm in the evening.
Siddhartha walked the length of the bridge, met the driver and yet again asked him to take a U-turn as he wanted to walk some more and asked the driver to wait at the other end. However, he did not return to the car till 8 pm. Following this, Patil phoned Siddhartha' son Amarthya and an associate Pradeep Shetty and on their directions, he filed a complaint at Kankanadi town police station.
Talking to the New Indian Express, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Hanumantharaya said search operations kicked off from around 10 pm in the night after the dog squad narrowed down the possible jump spot. Multiple teams of local fishermen swung into action. "Apart from local fishermen, a 21-member district disaster relief and coast guard team is carrying out the search operation at Netravati River and on the coast at Bengre," he said.
Coast Guard Commandant, Surendra Dasila said a slew of IGCS assets are deployed. He informed that IGCS Rajdoot has been tasked with patrolling off old Mangaluru port and maintain a sharp lookout very close to the harbour mouth, while ACV(H-198) is undertaking a search in the Netravati river and providing support to coast guard diving teams. Besides this, ICGS Savitribai Pule has also been kept on standby for deployment off the old Mangaluru port.
Praveen Malpe, a private rescue expert, said in the night hours there will be low tide and after 12 hours, the river witnesses high tide by which time the body may have reached near the sea.
The police are now checking to see who he interacted with last, Mangaluru Police Commissioner Sandeep Patil said. Patil spoke to Krishna and Siddhartha's wife in Bengaluru to gather more inputs. On Tuesday morning, a helicopter also joined in the search.
Earlier this year, Siddhartha had sold 3.27 crore worth shares that he held in Mindtree to L&T, prompting allegations of a hostile takeover bid by L&T. The sale was for around RS. 3,200 crore
Earlier in September 2017, I-T sleuths had searched properties and homes of Siddhartha in Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hassan, Chikkamagaluru and several places in Karnataka amid suspicions of tax evasion.
A letter, allegedly written by him addressing his employees and board of directors of CCD was also retrieved. He wrote: Every financial transaction is my responsibility...the law should hold me & only me accountable.
Reacting to the news, Siddhartha's good friend and the founder of Mindtree, Subroto Bagchi said, "I am stunned and shocked. I pray for his safe return. My heart goes out to the family in a time like this. He is a younger brother to me and I don't want any harm to him. ''
Political analysts said that Siddhartha was instrumental in Krishna deciding to join the BJP.
Speaking to The New Indian Express, Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Chairperson and Managing Director of Biocon said, "I have known him for many many years because we all started of our business at almost the same time.
I am absolutely shocked to hear the very sad news. I have known him for many years. I have always known him to be a very quiet and unassuming entrepreneur. He did a great job, completely pulled ahead of Barista. If you were to believe the note he has left, very sad to hear that he was being harassed from so many quarters."
(This is a developing story)