Ashapura Intimate, makers of the Valentine brand lingerie is in a free fall. The stock price today hit the 5% LC at Rs.162.40, which is also a new 52-week low. There are only sellers on the counter. The stock price, over the past two weeks has crashed over 60%.

The company’s Chairman and Managing Director Harshad Thakkar has gone missing.

The notice put out to the stock exchanges yesterday said, “This is to inform you that a missing person complaint has been filed with the Mumbai Police by the family of our managing director. The complaint is being presently investigated.  The professional management team along with Darshana Thakkar, who has been with the company since last few years and has been driving the design and production functions at the company, will be overseeing the operations of the company. The board of the company will be meeting in the first week of November 2018 to finalise the necessary actions for continuing the growth momentum in the business and capital requirement.”

The drop in the share price has led to the transfer of ownership of some shares from the promoter group to the IIFL group. IIFL Securities acquired 28.72% stake which was pledged with it against a loan; this takes its total shareholding in the company to 32.93%, including the 4.21% stake already held. The shares acquired by IIFL do not carry any voting rights.

Promoters stake now stands reduced from 57% to 24%.