Time line of events :
December : Joined A startup as a team lead.
January : Got paid late for December month salary at 10th January instead of last payment date 15th. Got paid in half and another half was paid at ~15th of January.
February : Got paid late (in half salary) for January month around 8th of February. Another part payment around 20th of feb.
March : Got paid late around 20th march (in half salary)
April : no payment at all for march
May : half payment for March salary pending, no payment for april. I Got sick due to very much financial stress. Need to take payday loan at 256% APR just to have food and rent
June : Not paid for May month , all past payment is due on. On 20th June, After 2 days of sick leave, when I returned to the company premise, I have to meet the founder outside of the premise and he told me that they were not able to manage the funds and try to downsize the team, In this process they want to me take a break and return either as a remote freelancer or full-time depending upon the financial condition of the organization. I didn't have any option apart from being agreed and start looking for another opportunities. Also we agreed that they will pay my pending amount in next three months time.
July : Waited for another opportunity, Also waited for the some part of the pending amount. I got nothing. The phone was not reachable. The current employee of the company has no idea where the founder is and when he will return. Though he was controlling their work from the slack. My official email id got blocked, I was removed from the slack. I could not able to send the Resignation latter to official email Id. Asked for personal email id but not got any reply.
August : Posted physical resignation letter to the company address. Since we were working in co-working space, The company changed the city and the resignation letter I send in post got back to me.
September : I got a new offer from diff. company. I decided to join that and for that I need a reliving letter from the past organization. I asked in a phone call for reliving letter, instead of dispatching the letter the founder yelled at me for not coming back as a freelancer. AND HE ALSO DECIDED THAT I WOULD BE CONSIDERED AS TERMINATED FOR DISCIPLINARY ACTIONS!!!. I joined the new firm anyhow.
October : The three month proposed and agreed are over. I was not in mood to beg for the pending salary instead I was firm to take strong actions.
November - January :Still not able to decided that what to do to this guy. He already moved his base to another city.
The company is based in India and You can already sense that the founder is very toxic.
Now I am stable enough to think carefully. Please advice me for the next steps to take which could not fail.
