India’s biggest coffee chain commits suicide

VG Siddhartha the founder and owner of India’s largest coffee chain, Café  Coffee Day, allegedly committed suicide and his body has been found by fisher men near a river on the outskirts of the southern city of Mangalore according to police.

VG Siddhartha went missing on Monday after apparently walking away from his car and driver.

Mr Siddhartha’s company, Coffee Day Enterprises Ltd, held an emergency board meeting on Monday to discuss his absence and issued a statement for “ the support and strength of all our stakeholders”.

The 59-year-old tycoon, born to a family of coffee plantation owners, started his first company as an investment firm and used the profits from it to enter the coffee business. His decision to start a chain of cafes was inspired after a chat with the owners of Tchibo, a German coffee chain.  Café Coffee Day opened its first outlet in the southern city of Bangalore in 1996 and wooed customers by offering them free internet with a cappuccino.

Mr Siddhartha is the son-in-law of former Karnataka chief minister SM Krishna and his wife on the board of Café Coffee Day and is survived by two children.

In a suicide letter signed by Mr Siddhartha says he was in debt and had “ failed to create the right profitable business model despite my best efforts. My intention was never to cheat or mislead anybody. I have failed as a entrepreneur”. Siddhartha also accuses a former director general of the income tax department of harassing him which he says led to a serious liquidity crunch.

Café Coffee Day is India’s largest coffee franchise chain with  1, 750 cafes across  India, Malaysia , Nepal and Egypt.

Mr Siddhartha owned a 33 per cent stake in  the company, but through his family and holding companies controlled closer to 50 per cent. Recently he had been in talks with Coca-Cola to sell the company for  £1.19bn ($1.45bn). Shares of the company have fallen around 20 per cent since his disappearance was reported.