Café Coffee Day Enterprises shares crack 20 pc after Chairman goes missing

Shares of Coffee Day Enterprises Ltd dropped 20 per cent on Tuesday after news surfaced that its Chairman and Managing Director V G Siddhartha has gone missing. The scrip tumbled 20 per cent and hit its lower circuit limit as well as its 52-week low of Rs 154.05 on the BSE. At the NSE, shares cracked 20 per cent and fell to its 52-week low of Rs 153.40.

In a filing to the BSE on Tuesday morning, the company said "V G Siddhartha, Chairman and Managing Director of Coffee Day Enterprises Limited is not reachable since yesterday evening. We are taking the help of concerned authorities," Coffee Day Enterprises said in a regulatory filing. "Company is professionally managed and led by competent leadership team, which will ensure continuity of business," the filing added.

Siddhartha, the son-in-law of former Karnataka chief minister S M Krishna, was headed for Sakaleshpur but on the way he had asked his driver to go towards Mangaluru, according to the police.

On reaching a bridge over the Netravati river in the Kotepura area in Dakshina Kannada district, he got down from the car and told his driver that he was going for a walk.

"He (Siddhartha) asked the driver to wait till his arrival. When he did not return even after two hours, the driver approached the police and lodged a missing complaint," deputy commissioner of Dakshina Kannada district Senthil Sasikant Senthil told PTI.

Meanwhile, the state government has already started search operations in the Netravati bridge area.