Court summons top McDonald officials in cheating case

The CEO of USA-based McDonald's Corporation, top officials of McDonald's India and several businessmen have been summoned by a court here for alleged criminal conspiracy and siphoning of hundreds of crores from the food chain's Indian subsidiary Connaught Plaza Restaurants (CPR) Ltd.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Sandeep Garg passed the order on the complaint of Delhi-based Deepak Khosla against top officials of various companies allegedly involved in the conspiracy, including ex-CPR Managing Director Vikram Bakshi and his wife for siphoning of over Rs 409 crore from the company and falsifying its books of accounts.
Besides Vikram Bakshi and his wife, the court has summoned the chairman, vice chairman and president of McDonald's USA, directors of McDonald's India and officials of various other hotel companies and their auditing firms for offences including cheating, criminal conspiracy and criminal breach of trust under IPC.

The court also referred the matter tothe SEBI chairman for examining thecaseforcontraventionofprovisionsof the SEBIAct andRegulationsmade thereunder.
According to the complaint, Vikram Bakshi, MD of ConnaughtPlaza Restaurants (P)Ltd, which is running the McDonalds chain ofrestaurantsinnorthandeasternIndia, is allegedtohavesiphonedout Rs409.75lakh from CPR and a partofthissumhasbeen siphonedoutby him throughanother accusedcompany Ascot Hotels&ResortsLtdwhichis also owned by him and his wife.
It alleged that Rs 1.85 crore was dishonestly withdrawn from the bank acocunt of CPR in 2006 at the instance of the Bakshi couple to finance the takeover of a company of Khosla's wife Sonia in violation of the SEBI regulations.
Sonia is the founder, director, promoter and majority shareholder of Montreax Resorts.