'Not Given Autopsy Report, Saw It In News': Sunjay Kapur's Sister To NDTV

Mandhira Kapur, the sister of Sona Comstar Chairman Sunjay J Kapur, narrated how her 80-year-old mother struggled to come to terms with the fact that her only son was no more, amid a barrage of insensitive comments from some sections.

The first shock the family got was the details of the postmortem report coming in the media in bits and pieces and the family not getting it directly, Mandhira Kapur told NDTV.

Her brother who headed the Rs 30,000 crore mobility tech company died on June 12 while playing polo in London; the autopsy report indicated the cause as a cardiac arrest. Some reports had said a bee stung Sunjay Kapur in his throat, which led to complications and his death.

Mandhira Kapur told NDTV the postmortem report does not mention any bee or bee sting.

Sunjay and Mandhira Kapur's mother, Rani Kapur, had written to the British authorities asking for more details about the circumstances surrounding her son's death. The letter had created quite a stir.

Mandhira Kapur defended her mother's decision to write that letter, as any mother would want to know what happened to her son.

"How do you tell a mother that her 53-year-old, very fit son died of a bee sting? And that's all we've heard. We don't know anything else. We were told he swallowed a bee and got stung," Mandhira Kapur told NDTV.

"... No one was answering our questions. So, as a mother, she has a right to know what happened to her son. And under British law, she has the right. It's as simple as reaching out. If no one's answering us, we have got to reach out to someone to get an answer. For my mother, for us to know what happened to this healthy person," Mandhira Kapur said.

"How has a bee gone into his mouth and how has he died of a bee sting? The postmortem report doesn't mention the bee. In fact, it's all denied now that there was even a bee. It was a cardiac arrest that happened while he was playing polo," she said.

The most tragic part in all this was seeing the postmortem report of her brother from details reported by the media, Mandhira Kapur said.

"We didn't get the postmortem report. I got it through the media. So how can a bee now turn into a cardiac arrest of a healthy person who, from what I've heard, had his heart checked and didn't have any problems and suddenly had 40 per cent of an artery blocked?" she said.

On whether the postmortem report was sent to her mother, Mandhira Kapur said, "It was not sent to her. I got it from the media. I'm the one who shared it with her, and I only got one page. Then it was sent to me through a relative. There were three pages. That's how we got it (postmortem report)," she told NDTV.

Rani Kapur - who said she has majority shareholder status - had alleged she was coerced into signing documents supporting the nomination of her daughter-in-law, Priya Sachdev Kapur, as a non-executive director.

After that, Sona Comstar sent a cease-and-desist letter to Rani Kapur.

On the claim by Sona Comstar that Rani Kapur did not hold any shares since 2019, Mandhira Kapur said that just as the world is finding out, "we are also finding out."

As chairman of Sona Comstar from 2019 onward, Sunjay Kapur continued to guide the company's strategic direction and under his chairmanship, the company expanded its global footprint across India, the US, Mexico, China, and Serbia, successfully listed on BSE and NSE, and entered future mobility domains such as sensors and software through the acquisition of a majority stake in Novelic.