Hindustan Times: Business tycoon Vijay Mallya has been named as a ‘fugitive economic offender’ by a Mumbai court, the first person to be hit by a new law that empowers the government to seize properties of individuals who flee the country to escape prosecution. This is Mallya’s second setback in the last one month. In December, a UK court had allowed his extradition to India to face trial for fraud and money laundering.
Vijay Mallya has been under investigation in India in connection with huge loans taken for his now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines from a consortium of 12 banks led by the State Bank of India. It had moved the special PMLA court invoking provisions of the Fugitive Economic Offenders Act, 2018, seeking to declare Mallya a fugitive economic offender.
The special PMLA court and the Bombay High Court had dismissed Mallya’s pleas that “he was not a fugitive economic offender” and not involved in the scheduled offence of money laundering. Mallya had then approached the Supreme Court but it last month only asked the Centre to respond to Mallya’s petition against the move and did not stay the proceedings.
The businessman is facing extradition from the United Kingdom to India to face charges of financial irregularities running into thousands of crores. Mallya fled India in March 2016 even as a debt court in Bengaluru was set to act against him for defaulting on loans issued by several banks led by the state-owned State Bank of India.
Besides the extradition case, Mallya is also facing recovery action against his assets in the UK brought by 13 Indian banks and another mortgage recovery action by the UBS Bank against his house in central London.
Our time is a news portal