Technopark arrest theory
By Shalini Singh

UK-based Alamy claims to hold the largest and most comprehensive online collection of commercial photography in the world. Established in 1999, Alamy pioneered the concept of an unedited collection and sells images taken by thousands of photographers and photo agencies. Its ex-CEO operating from Technopark, Kerala had left in a hurry and in unclear circumstances.

Techgoss was the first to break the story of Alamy CEO Anil Thricovil’s hasty exit from Technopark which we followed up with a report of his arrest for allegedly cyber harassing a woman.

One of the most popular tech forums in Kerala MyTechnopark.com currently has an interesting discussion among the locals about what really happened at Alamy.  Few participants speak highly about Alamy while others were not even aware of Anil’s arrest.  Yesterday a new member ‘Truth’ published a possible scenario in this tech forum. 

“
Hi admin, Rajan and others. I know the truth ok, (I know once I claim you will ask for proof, but I cannot prove, or I will have to reveal my identity, so let’s get practical). I believe that whatever I say, some of you will not believe, and will still ask for proof and all that. That is not going to happen. I know the truth from a third person’s perspective. Of course you can cross check with your own friends at Alamy or elsewhere. Use your own judgment.

The ex Ceo of Alamy, Anil, is a gentleman as far as I know. But there were lot of complaints inside the company among people about the sudden changes he implemented after taking office. Most of the complaints were not officially reported, but were doing the rounds as gossip or whatever you call it. Some of the things that employees did not like was his favoritism. He promoted people who he liked and sacked some people among who were people who existed right from the start of the company’s inception.

People came people went. Anil remained the same. Just like any other office, business went as usual. Now the story about a girl in the company – who I won’t name, and about the guy.

There was this girl who got promoted (people say favoritism) from a lower level job and all (customer care or something) to a senior level unnaturally and immediately she had to go for official tours with Anil to various places. (Read further to see why this part is significant) then after some time, the girls husband got invited to the company too in a very very senior position. He was also a very junior level fellow in another company in Technopark. So this all gave fodder to more gossip only, saying Anil favored the girl and she compromised for her husband and all bull s**t.

Everything went alright when one fine day another major incident happened. Another female employee (senior) lodged a formal complaint to the organizations owners in UK. The owners took it seriously and took action on the CEO. He was immediately sent on long leave without any reason given. After some days, without giving any reason, the employees were told he had left the company.

Now the major twist. After leaving alamy, the ex ceo (alleged only, no proof) made threatening calls to the first female employee (whose husband was also invited to join the company) and even created blogs in her name (with vulgar content and her photo). This included bad comments about her husband. (I have seen those blogs earlier, but don’t want to share the links, Google search and find out).

This incident only made the employee file a police complaint about the CEO and upon investigation he was arrested.

There is no proof, as it is always in such stories.

If you want to know the real story with proof - go to Alamy and ask any employee you know. Obviously none of them will say anything to strangers, it’s a police case. Or ask the police, they will be able to give proof.

Don’t ask me the girl name, or anything else please. These are all what we know from 3rd person perspective. To know the truth from a closer view I have to be Anil or the girl who complained, or her husband.
“

(Techgoss had published the following story on July 28, 2009)

Technopark company ex-CEO arrested for harassment
By Shalini Singh

UK-based Alamy claims to hold the largest and most comprehensive online collection of commercial photography in the world. Established in 1999, Alamy pioneered the concept of an unedited collection and sells images taken by thousands of photographers and photo agencies. Its ex-CEO operating from Technopark, Kerala had left in a hurry and in unclear circumstances.

The Board and senior management in UK have never given a proper explanation to the Alamy workers at Technopark as to why the CEO, Anil Thricovil, suddenly stopped attending office.

Earlier, Techgoss had reported exclusively that Anil has been ‘let go’ because a person in the Alamy HR Department had leveled allegations of harassment against him. After techgoss ran the article, an unidentified person posing as an Alamy employee emailed me saying Anil Thricovil has no differences with the HR Department. Techgoss doubled checked with the person from the HR Department who flatly denied sending the email.  The email sent to techgoss was a fake and designed to stop our investigation.

Now, Anil Thricovil has been arrested by the Trivandrum Police.  The police arrested him in the evening of July 27 for harassing a woman employee of a company in Technopark through phone and emails. Anil, who is a resident of a posh colony in the city, has no full time job since his exit from Alamy. A police team lead by the Circle Inspector of the Museum Police Station in the city raided his house at 830 pm; arrested Anil and confiscated his computer. Anil had been calling the woman from the city for three months.  According to the police, Emails sent by him were traced to Net cafes near General Hospital and Engineering College. The Hitech Cyber Crime cell had traced the phone calls and e-mails.

(Techgoss had published the following story on June 13, 2009)

Fake comment about Technopark company ex-CEO
By Shalini Singh

UK-based Alamy claims to hold the largest and most comprehensive online collection of commercial photography in the world. Established in 1999, Alamy pioneered the concept of an unedited collection and sells images taken by thousands of photographers and photo agencies. Its ex-CEO operating from Technopark, Kerala had left in a hurry and in unclear circumstances.

The Board and senior management in UK have never given a proper explanation to the Alamy workers at Technopark as to why the CEO, Anil Thricovil, stopped attending office.

In May, 2009, techgoss has reported exclusively that: “CEO Anil Thricovil left his Alamy Technopark offices at very short notice on April 28, 2008.  There is much gossip at the Alamy offices in Technopark in Kerala that it had something to do with a person from their HR Department. Did he walk over ‘differences in the big picture’ or was he pushed because of some ‘personal issue’?” No one is talking.  But techgoss has reliably learnt that it was due to some kind of clash with a person from the HR Department.

Quite mysteriously, after the techgoss article was published, we received a comment on our website purportedly to be from a person from the Alamy HR Department saying there were no differences between the HR Department and it ex-CEO.  The comment to techgoss which displayed a genuine email address of a person at HR Department read:

“
The HR section at Alamy did not have any difference with the CEO. In fact, both the offices worked quite well
“
 
Before posting the comment on our website, Techgoss sent a reply to the email address of the HR person at Alamy.  They flatly denied having left any comment describing their relationship with the ex-CEO as ‘quite well’.

The reply email from the HR Section at Alamy to techgoss read:

“
Thank you for your email on this instance.
 
However I would like to bring your attention to the matter that this comment is not posted by us in your website. Somebody has used my email id to post it.
 
I hereby confirm that this comment is not posted by me on your website and would like to inform you not to publish this comment on your website.
 
As you are using an advanced tool I am sure you must be able to track down the IP address or the user details from which the post has been made.

Appreciate your efforts in confirming the comments before posting it.
 
Many thanks
“

Interesting, is it not?

Techgoss has deliberately censored out the name, sex, email address, location and any other information that could identify the person in the Alamy HR Department as they did not post the fake comment about their ex-CEO.  Someone has misused an email address by adding it to a fake comment to mislead anyone reading the article.

(Techgoss had published the following story on May 15, 2009)

Technopark company ex-CEO does not update profile
By Shalini Singh

UK-based Alamy claims to hold the largest and most comprehensive online collection of commercial photography in the world. Established in 1999, Alamy pioneered the concept of an unedited collection and offers millions of images from thousands of photographers and photo agencies. Its ex-CEO operating from Technopark, Kerala has left but not updated his LinkedIn profile

Alamy says on their website that a key ingredient of their success is fairness. All of their contributing photographers and photo agencies enjoy more flexible contracts and earn a higher royalty than with most of their competitors.

By all accounts Alamy is a good company to work for.  Since 2006, Alamy has been donating a minimum of 1 million pounds to medical research projects.  Their Offices in Technopark, Kerala have about 100 employees, many of them techies who manage their hardware and software system. 

While addressing the Kerala Venture Capital Summit organized by Technopark Companies (GTECH) ,  the then India CEO, Anil Thricovil, Alamy Images was quoted as saying: “My company focuses a lot on is training, and specially changing people's attitudes. If you look at the Movies in Kerala you will see that the common theme is Gossip and Revenge. Movies often reflect the people's sensibilities, and one key aspect to the training focus in his company is to show that the best revenge in life is to live successfully. In our company, effort is made to channel energy in useful ways by encouraging sports club, reading club, and take time out for corporate social responsibility. The Kerala center is so successful that there are more employees of the company in Kerala than in UK.”

But techgoss has learnt that CEO Anil Thricovil left his Alamy Technopark offices at very short notice on April 28, 2008.  There is much gossip at the Alamy offices in Technopark in Kerala that it had something to do with a person from their HR Department. Did he walk over ‘differences in the big picture’ or was he pushed because of some ‘personal issue’ ? Techgoss is investigating and we hope to bring you the true story as soon as we have established the facts.

Anil Thricovil is no longer the CEO of Alamy, India.  He left is such a hurry that his LinkedIn profile still says he is the CEO even after 2 weeks of leaving the company.  LinkedIn is the most popular business networking site in India and is used by as many as 1 million middle and senior Indian executives.