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In 1990s, Best and Crompton workers called Vijay Mallya ‘NPA’

Published

9 years ago

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vijayChennai:Long before some Indian banks termed Vijay Mallya, the promoter of Kingfisher Airlines, a “wilful defaulter”, workers of the city based Best and Crompton Engineering had publicly called him an “NPA” — non-performing asset.

They also urged Mallya to quit the company.

Normally, company annual general meetings (AGMs) are boring affairs with some shareholders demanding sweet packets.

But once in a decade or more, one will be fortunate enough to witness an interesting shareholders meeting where individual shareholders pose strong questions to the corporate emperors.

And one such AGM this city saw was that of Best and Crompton’s held in 1990s.

At that time the company was part of Mallya’s UB Group and was not doing well.

Disillusioned workers and shareholders of Best and Crompton dubbed their chairman Mallya an NPA and also asked him to resign from the board.

Placards with slogans against Mallya added more colours to the scene.

However, due credit has to be given to Mallya at the way he conducted the meeting.

At one point, a smiling Mallya even told the shareholders to speak one-by-one so that he can hear them all!

The historic AGM was adjourned as no business was transacted due to the noisy scenes.

Mallya later sold Best and Crompton to an Indonesian group.

Prior to that, he had sold Best and Crompton’s stake in the elevator joint venture company Beacon Kone to the other joint venture partner Kone Group of Finland.

“The mood of the shareholders was aggressive. Many workers complained that the company did not remit the provident fund (PF) directions to the PF office. One shareholder pointedly told Mallya ‘You have closed several group companies – (Best and Crompton). You did not open anything new’,” said M. Ramesh, senior deputy editor, The Hindu Business Line, recalling the AGM meeting.

“At one point,” Ramesh said, “Mallya was talking to a fellow board member, at which a shareholder angrily told him to listen to him rather than talking to others. Mallya coolly replied, ‘I’m listening to you’ and reeled out the points that the shareholders raised in their speech.”

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What monkey fled with a bag containing evidence in it: Read full story

Published

3 years ago

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May 5, 2022

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The court, generally, considers a person who commit a crime and the one who destroys the evidence, as criminals in the eyes of law. But what if an animal destroys the evidence of a crime committed by a human.

In a peculiar incident in Rajasthan, a monkey fled away with the evidence collected by the police in a murder case. The stolen evidence included the murder weapon (a blood-stained knife).

The incident came to light when the police appeared before the court and they had to provide the evidence in the hearing.

The hearing was about the crime which took place in September 2016, in which a person named Shashikant Sharma died at a primary health center under Chandwaji police station. After the body was found, the deceased’s relatives blocked the Jaipur-Delhi highway, demanding an inquiry into the matter.

Following the investigation, the police had arrested Rahul Kandera and Mohanlal Kandera, residents of Chandwaji in relation to the murder. But, when the time came to produce the evidence related to the case, it was found that the police had no evidence with them because a monkey had stolen it from them.

In the court, the police said that the knife, which was the primary evidence, was also taken by the monkey. The cops informed that the evidence of the case was kept in a bag, which was being taken to the court.

The evidence bag contained the knife and 15 other important evidences. However, due to the lack of space in the malkhana, a bag full of evidence was kept under a tree, which led to the incident.

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