the goan I network
PANAJI
Kingfisher Villa, a sprawling 12,350 sq mts property at Candolim, once belonged to controversial industrialist,
Vijay Mallya.
Mallya was known to host lavish parties at this villa, where celebs from all over the world were regular. The villa was actually owned by United Breweries, a company controlled by Mallya. Further, it was mortgaged by Kingfisher Airlines, another company owned by Mallya, to a consortium of banks to raise funds.
Mallya’s business fortunes nose-dived and he was unable to pay back the money he had borrowed from the lenders. It is reported that Mallya owed a whopping `9,000 crore to
the lenders.
After the lenders failed to recover the money from Mallya, they seized possession of Kingfisher Villa in May 2016, post which several attempts were made to find bidders for this property through the auction route, but none yielded any results.
For instance, the consortium of lenders led by the State Bank of India (SBI) tried selling the villa through auction in October last year by keeping the reserve price at `85.29 crore, but not a single bidder turned up.
Subsequently, another attempt was made to sell it by auction in December 2016 by lowering the reserve price by 5 per cent to `81 crore, which also turned out to be a dud affair, as it couldn’t be sold.
The last attempt to sell Kingfisher Villa through auction was made in March 2017 by keeping the reserve price at `73 crore, which too was
a failure.
Finally, after all these failed attempts, SBI led consortium has managed to sell the villa to actor-businessman Sachiin Joshi reportedly at slightly more than `73 crore.
Joshi made his debut in Bollywood in 2011. Earlier to that, he has also worked in Telugu movies. In 2013, Joshi also acted in a Hindi film called Jackpot, which was based in Goa. He is also the owner of Planet Hollywood Beach Resort in Utorda. Apart from that, Joshi also has stake in fitness businesses as well.
