Coffee baron VG Siddhartha, the founder of India's iconic chain Cafe Coffee Day, is missing

• VG Siddhartha is reportedly missing near Netravati River in Mangalore since Monday night.
• The development came in after the Mangalore City Police started a search operation at 9 pm to look for a man who might have jumped off a kilometer-long bridge in Ullal.
• Siddhartha reportedly faced a cash crunch earlier this year after the default by infrastructure lending giant IL&FS, which forced him to sell stake in the IT firm Mindtree.

Cafe Coffee Day founder and son-in-law of ex-Karnataka Chief Minister SM Krishna, VG Siddhartha , is reportedly missing near Netravati River in Mangaluru since Monday night. Police says, his phone is switched off, the Times of India reported.

The development came in after the Mangalore City Police started a search operation at 9 pm to look for a man who might have jumped off a kilometer-long bridge in Ullal. According to the report, Siddhartha may be the missing 'man' since he reached Mangaluru at 8 pm in his SUV and ask the driver to drop him at the bridge in Ullal.

The 58-year-old entrepreneur was in talks with Coca-Cola to sell considerable stake in his coffee chain. The deal was supposed to be closed by the end of March 2020.

VG Siddhartha came from a coffee-growing family, which owned 15,000 acres of coffee estate in Chikmagalur in Karnataka. He launched the first Cafe Coffee Day (CCD) outlet on Brigade Road in Bengaluru. The chain currently has 1,750 outlets and over 60,000 vending machines spread over Nepal, Malaysia, Czech Republic, and Egypt, aside from 245 cities in India.

The coffee baron had reportedly been cornered by a cash crunch after the default by infrastructure lending giant IL&FS triggered a liquidity crisis in the country. Siddhartha had to sell his 20.4% stake in the IT firm Mindtree to L&T against the wishes of Mindtree’s founders who Siddhartha had backed since 1999.

SEE ALSO:

L&T takes over Mindtree in Indian IT’s first-ever hostile acquisition
Mindtree takeover battle: L&T deals the first blow buying coffee baron VG Siddhartha's stake