Rahul Yadav has resigned as the CEO of Housing.com, capping several weeks of drama at one of India's most watched startups and leaving investors with the challenge of restoring normalcy at the online real estate services company.

Yadav, 26, wrote a scornful resignation letter on April 30 to board members and investors denigrating their "intellectual capability" and giving them a one-week deadline to "help in the transition". The investors responded a day later through the law firm Morrison & Foerster LLP acknowledging the resignation. ET has seen both letters.

ET had reported in its edition dated March 12 that investors were considering a plan to remove Yadav, who studied at IIT-Bombay along with the other co-founders of Housing, because of concerns over strategy and his conduct. The board of Housing will meet on Tuesday to discuss the resignation and chart a new plan for the Mumbai-based company.

Housing shot to fame as one of India's startup success stories after Japan's SoftBank led an investment of $90 million (Rs 550 crore) in December, valuing it at Rs 1,500 crore. Since then, Yadav has been in the spotlight for the wrong reasons " he became embroiled in a social media dust-up with Sequoia Capital Managing Director Shailendra Singh and later the Times Group, which publishes this newspaper.

Late last month, SoftBank Vice-Chairman Nikesh Arora resigned from Housing's board. SoftBank executive Jonathan Bullock will take his place.

"I don't think you guys are intellectually capable enough to have any sensible discussion anymore. This is something which I not just believe but can prove on your faces also!" Yadav wrote in the opening paragraph of his letter resigning as CEO, chairman and a member of the board.

Documents accessed by ET show that Yadav owns about a 4.57% stake in the company. Nexus Ventures owns 19%, SoftBank 32%, and Helion Ventures and Falcon Edge about 10% each. Yadav, Sharma and investors including SoftBank's Arora, Helion's Ashish Gupta and Nexus' Suvir Sujan did not reply to separate emails.



Read the full text of the e-mail exchange between Housing CEO & the board.



(With inputs from Madhav Chanchani in Mumbai)