In latest setback to Vijay Mallya, the Central Bureau of Investigation started the process to extradite the business tycoon from UK by filing an affidavit in court, saying that he is a “wanted criminal”.
The affidavit will be submitted to the ministry of external affairs, which will then approach its UK counterparts for the extradition.
The CBI is expected to approach the Ministry of External Affairs as part of its latest bid to have the businessman tried in an Indian court of law.
The development follows claims and counterclaims made by the Bharatiya Janata Party and Congress about the controversial bail out given to Mallya’s defunct Kingfisher Airlines. On Monday, Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had refuted Bharatiya Janata Party allegations that he assisted Mallya in securing financial assistance to bail out the defunct Kingfisher Airlines.
Meanwhile, defending former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh following allegations that the UPA regime facilitated loans to Vijay Mallya’s now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines from a consortium of banks, the Congress Party looked to turn the tables on the ruling dispensation asking how did they let the liquor baron leave the nation in the first place. Demanding the Centre to provide evidence of the charges against Dr Singh, Congress leader Rizwan Arshad asserted that Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led party has never been able to produce a shred of proof in its allegations.
The move comes a week after CBI filed a charge sheet against the liquor baron in the Rs 900 crore IDBI loans case before a special court in Mumbai, alleging that Kingfisher Airlines allegedly diverted Rs 263 crore from Rs 900 crore IDBI loan for “personal use”.
The agency has named nine people whom it arrested on Monday in the case —— former chairman of IDBI Yogesh Aggarwal, former CFO of the Kingfisher Airlines A Raghunathan, IDBI executives O V Bundellu, S K V Srinivasan, R S Sridhar, B K Batra, and Kingfisher executives Shailesh Borke, A C Shah and Amit Nadkarni —— in the charge sheet, leaving out Mallya, as he is yet to be arrested.
It has slapped IPC sections related to criminal conspiracy, cheating and provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act on the accused. CBI sources said the agency has kept its probe open in the issue of suspected quid pro quo by Mallya and executives of Kingfisher Airlines to expedite the loan process.
