A biography of ‘Coffee King’ VG Siddhartha would be released early next year. “Coffee King: The Swift Rise and Sudden Death of Café Coffee Day Founder VG Siddhartha” by business journalists Rukmini Rao and Prosenjit Datta and published by Pan Macmillan India. The book pieces together the dynamic rise of Siddhartha as a businessman and his fall from grace. It also tries to unravel the reasons that led to his financial crisis and eventually his untimely death.
The biography of VG Siddhartha is expected to offer much more than the story of the man who created India’s biggest coffee chain, Café Coffee Day. Teesta Sarkar, head of the editorial, Pan Macmillan India said, “In-depth research combined with emphatic approach has made this project as the most definitive book there may ever be on India’s Coffee King. Rao and Dutta have also investigated the life and death of Siddhartha which has culminated into a riveting, finely nuanced narrative.”
“What we realized during our research is that the organization built by Siddhartha was far more complex than what appears on the surface. We have unraveled his story layer by layer and have explored his avatars, professional and personal and, where the two intersected,” Dutta, one of the authors of the book, said.
Siddhartha was co-founder of India’s largest coffee retail chain – Café Coffee Day. He was backed by some of the top names of the Indian IT service industry in his endeavor. But huge financial losses in the business led to his alleged suicide. He was found dead on July 31, 2019, near Mangalore.
Rao, the other co-author, says, “The book will bring all the unknown aspects about Siddhartha to present a holistic portrait of him. It is sure to offer much more than a story of the man who created India’s biggest coffee chain.”
