A pall of gloom descended on the Grandhi household as it became evident by Thursday afternoon that Grandhi Manoj Kumar (46), chairman of the Vaibhav Group, was murdered in Bangalore.
The hopes of his family members and relatives that Manoj would return home safely, were shattered on Thursday as information started pouring in from Bangalore that the accused had confessed to the police to having murdered him. He was said to have been murdered in the car and the body was thrown from the ghat road at Tumkur, around 250 km from Bangalore.
Stream of visitors
There was a steady stream of visitors at Manoj's flat at the posh Pandurangapuram area near the beach on Thursday. Media persons were denied entry into the apartment complex.
Manoj had purchased jewellery at Jaipur in Rajasthan, then some jewellery in Hyderabad before making some more purchases at a jewellery exhibition in Bangalore on February 6. He bought the jewellery for an advertisement shoot for the Vaibhav Group with actor Shruti Hasan in Mumbai, Manoj's close friends — proprietor of Kanakatala Silks K. Mallikarjuna Rao (Mallik) and chairman of the Pydah Group of Educational Institutions Pydah Krishna Prasad, who is also son-in-law of Tamil Nadu Governor K. Rosaiah, — told the media on return from Bangalore on Thursday evening.
Former Chairman of Bar Council of India D.V. Subba Rao called on the family members and consoled them on Thursday morning. He expressed dismay at the murder and concern at the declining values in society. A native of Eluru in West Godavari district, Manoj moved to Visakhapatnam and started a small jewellery showroom Vaibhav Jewellers in 1995. He set up the V-Square, a jewellery and textile mall, in partnership with his friend Mallik. The mall employs 250 staff and the Vaibhav Group turnover was said to be around Rs.350 crore. It is also learnt that he had entered into an MoU with a major hotel group for construction of a star hotel in the heart of the city. He had planned to open jewellery showrooms in Vijayawada, Kakinada and Rajahmundry.
Describing the incident as ‘most unfortunate', Mr. Mallik assured customers that all his plans and schemes would be continued by his wife, brother and other family members. The body would arrive here on Friday afternoon and it would be kept at V-Square from 2 p.m. on the day. He is survived by wife and three daughters.
