Snapdeal gets Rs 300-crore legal notice from GoJavas’ parent company Quickdel Logistics

Quickdel Logistics, the parent of GoJavas, the e-commerce-focused logistics firm that had raised investment from Snapdeal, has sent a Rs 300 crore legal notice to Snapdeal founders Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, and Jasper Infotech, the entity which runs Snapdeal. Anand Rai, who had acquired Snapdeal’s stake in GoJavas and merged it with his Pigeon Express, told TOI Snapdeal stopped doing business with GoJavas for the benefit of Vulcan and “stole” confidential business information such as data on employees and service vendors.A Snapdeal spokesperson termed the charge baseless. Snapdeal held 49% stake in GoJavas and the founders of the company had sold it to Rai in a fire sale.

“I’ve sent them a legal notice worth Rs 300 crore for criminal breach of trust against GoJavas which resulted in erosion of value of Quickdel,” Rai said.

The notice, reviewed by TOI, accuses the founders and the company of criminal breach of trust and siphoning off money from GoJavas to Vulcan Express, the in-house logistics firm of Snapdeal.

Quickdel’s notice comes after Jasper Infotech filed a first information report (FIR) with the Delhi Police against the former promoters and directors of Quickdel -Praveen Sinha, Randhir Singh, Ashish Chaudhary and Abhijeet Singh.
The four are accused of cheating, forgery, criminal breach of trust, conspiracy and criminal misappropriation of funds. The complaint said Snapdeal was “induced” to buy shares in Quickdel.

The timing of Snapdeal’s complaint was interesting, coming as it did when it was in the middle of merger talks with rival Flipkart.

When contacted, a Snapdeal spokesperson termed Quickdel’s allegations as baseless. The spokesperson also said it is in direct contradiction of the `Release and Settlement Agreement’ executed by Rai and Quickdel on March 31.

This agreement, he said, had completely released Jasper Infotech, Jasper Group and its officers, employees, nominees, directors and others from all liabilities consequences arising out of the share purchase agreement, share acquisition & shareholders’ agreement, and master logistics services agreement.