DS Kulkarni faces 100 crore rupees defamation suit, says working to ‘pay back’ investors
The defamation suit is the latest twist in the tale for the company which has fallen into serious financial and legal trouble since early this year.
D S Kukarni
D S Kulkarni, the promoter of the embattled DSK group, said on Monday that he was working towards paying back the dues of all investors in his company, even as fresh trouble arose for him in the form of a Rs 100-crore defamation notice from a close relative.
Kedar Vanjape, the son-in-law of Kulkarni’s elder brother, has sent a legal notice to Kulkarni, demanding a public apology and Rs 100 crore in damages for comments that Kulkarni had made against him at a press conference here last month. The press conference was organised to clarify Kulkarni’s stand after several investors had accused his company of defaulting on payments due to them. Kulkarni, who had accused Vanjape, a former employee of the DSK group, of “deliberately leaking sensitive information” about his company to bloggers, dismissed the legal notice as an attempt to play “monkey games”.
“These are all monkey games being played, and are being done to get even with me. The information which has been used by the bloggers, who are raising false allegations against me, have all been leaked by Vanjape. It is the same cycle which is repeating itself,” Kulkarni told this paper in his first comments to media after his November 21 press conference. He said that he would have sued Vanjape himself, but was too busy resurrecting his business. “I have to repay my fixed deposit holders, get Toyota (car dealership) back running. I do not have time for any other things. Let the courts decide,” he said.
Kulkarni said he had been travelling in the last few days in order to get his business back on track and was not “untraceable” as the Pune Police had claimed. On December 19, after he failed to keep his promise of depositing Rs 50 crore with the Bombay High Court, leading to a withdrawal of protection from arrest granted by the court, the Pune Police had claimed to have begun search operations to arrest Kulkarni, but said he could not be traced. A few days later, Kulkarni’s lawyer petitioned the Supreme Court and obtained time till January 19 to deposit Rs 50 crore. The money is meant to act as surety towards the eventual payment of dues to the investors of the DSK group.
The defamation suit is the latest twist in the tale for the company which has fallen into serious financial and legal trouble since early this year. A large number of fixed deposit holders had complained of default in payment and many had approached the Pune police to file FIRs against the builder. The Economic Offences Wing and other law enforcement agencies had snooped down on the builder’s properties and written to the inspector general of stamp duty, asking it to inform them about any land transfers effected by the company.
Meanwhile, Vanjape, who now runs a separate realty business, said he decided to send legal notice to his erstwhile employer because the allegations were entirely baseless. “I left the company in 2009 and since then I have not had contact with either Kulkarni or with the company,” he said, adding that he decided to leave the company because he was not comfortable with the way its business was being run.
The legal notice served by Vanjape has given Kulkarni eight days to tender a public apology to him and pay Rs 100 crore in damages, failing which he would move the courts to file a case.
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