Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Nov 21, 2002
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Nov 21, 2002 |
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Corporate
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Corporate Disputes Now, Coca-Cola files complaint over bottles Our Bureau
HYDERABAD, Nov. 20 THE ongoing `battle of the bottles' between the cola giants — Coca-Cola and Pepsi has moved one step away from a `truce'. It was Coca-Cola's turn on Wednesday to file a complaint with the police. Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages (HCCB) filed a first information report (FIR) with the police against Pepsi's action to destroy millions of returnable bottles, according to a Coca-Cola India release. The criminal conspiracy by Pepsi in connivance with its franchisee bottler, Charminar Bottling, was unearthed literally when a small police contingent swung into action to dig up the premises adjoining the Pepsi bottling plant near Hyderabad to discover huge number of empty bottles of various Coke brands carefully buried under the earth, the release claimed. Charminar Bottling was supposed to return these bottles, picked up from the market in exchange of its own empty bottles collected by HCCB from retail stores in keeping with the established trade practice between the two Cola companies for several years. However, Pepsi not only damaged and destroyed HCCB's assets, carrying the Coca-Cola Company's trademarks and committed a breach of trust, but levelled a false charge against the latter for holding Pepsi's bottles, despite the fact that HCCB was negotiating with Charminar Bottling for the exchange of these bottles for more than a week, the release said. Meanwhile, Charminar Bottling in a release said the police raids on the bottling plants and warehouses of Coca-Cola over the last three days resulted in the seizure of as many as 53-lakh empty Pepsi bottles (32 lakh from Ameenpura, 18 lakh from Maula Ali and three lakh from Kulsumpura). "This seizure, which is about 40 per cent of our entire glass stock in Hyderabad on any given day, has vindicated the suspicion of the Charminar Bottling Co that Coca-Cola was lifting our empty bottles from the market with an ulterior motive of blocking sales of our products in Hyderabad", a Charminar Bottling spokesperson said.
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