Shareholders of the Distilleries Company of Sri Lanka who attended last Thursday’s AGM of the company observed a minute’s silence at the inception of the meeting in memory of past DCSL Chairman V.P. (Totsy) Vittachi who passed away the previous week at the request of company’s incumbent chairman, Mr. Harry Jayawardena.

Serious differences between Jayawardena and Vittachi led to an irreconcilable breakdown in relations between them with Jayawardena, according to Vittachi, once threatening to shoot him.

Vittachi who was Chairman of DCSL since its privatization, with the Stassen/Milford Group holding the company’s controlling shares, was summarily removed from that position by Jayawardena a couple of years ago when the DCSL annual report was published without a chairman’s statement.

While Vittachi was Chairman of DCSL, Jayawardena occupied the chairman’s room and sat at the chairman’s desk by Vittachi’s account.

A shareholder’s request that DCSL should in Vittachi’s memory support two worthy charities, caring for the elderly and children in homes close to the company’s offices, was instantly accepted by Jayawardena at the AGM with the promise ``it will be done.’’

The AGM also saw Jayawardena angrily pitching into a shareholder who asked him a question on why directors of the company, with the exception of Mr. L.U.D. Fernando who held a single share, owned no shares.

``You’ve asked that question 25 times in the last 10 years,’’ Jayawardena snapped at the shareholder saying it had been answered in the past. ``I know why you keep asking it,’’ he continued threatening to expose the reasons.