Almost out of Zomato, but Pankaj Chaddah will not talk to you

The little-known co-founder of food tech unicorn, Zomato, quit the company recently. And some, if not barely anyone, really knew the person who is internally credited as the man behind the graft

The 32-year-old grew up in Indore with dreams of becoming a scientist

UAE was Chaddah's biggest success story; Zomato broke even ahead of schedule

As soon as Chaddah quit, Zomato announced a shakeup. Gaurav Gupta was appointed COO, Mukund Kulashekaran CBO

He has been part of a band, played football for Bain, and now, plays squash on weekends. All of this to de-stress

It is a difficult meeting. At a busy coffee shop in Gurugram. Music blares from the speakers, coffee machines busy, hissing, and Deepinder Goyal, the CEO and co-founder of Zomato, sits in a chair. He sips his tea, leans forward to hear the questions.

Did you read the email before he sent it?

Of course. We’re co-founders. We worked together for 10 years.

… I thought, maybe he wrote it independently…

No, why? When he wrote it he asked me to read it.

AUTHOR

Patanjali Pahwa

Patanjali has spent over seven years in journalism. He last worked at Business Standard as Principal Correspondent, where he wrote on startups, e-commerce companies and venture capital. He has worked at an array of institutions, which include Forbes India, Caravan and Outlook Business. He is a Mumbaikar, born and brought up. Patanjali did his BSc in IT from Mumbai University and then got his journalism degree from IIJNM in Bangalore. He is enamoured by Ernest Hemingway and Tom Waits and may try to sneak in references to them in his stories.

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