UK High Court allows seizure of Vijay Mallya's UK assets

A UK High Court judge has issued an order in favour of a consortium of 13 Indian banks, granting permission to the British Enforcement Officer to enter the properties of liquor baron Vijay Mallya in Hertfordshire, near London. He is fighting extradition to India on fraud and money laundering charges.

The order permits the UK High Court Enforcement Officer and his agents entry to Ladywalk and Bramble Lodge in Tewin, Welwyn, where the 62-year-old Mallya is currently based. However, it is not an instruction to enter, which means the banks have the option to use the order as one of the means to recover estimated funds of around £1.14 billion.

“The High Court Enforcement Officer, including any enforcement agents acting under his authority, may enter Ladywalk, Queen Hoo Lane, Tewin… including all outbuildings of Ladywalk and Bramble Lodge to search for and take control of goods belonging to Mallya,” notes the order by Justice Byran, dated June 26.

Vijay Mallya consults 'formidable' lawyer to defend him in extradition case

Beleaguered Indian businessman Vijay Mallya has consulted an award-winning lawyer, Claire Montgomery, the Queen’s Counsel, to fight the Indian government’s attempt to extradite him to India. Chambers & Partners, famous for ranking legal luminaries, described her as “the most formidable member of the bar”. Montgomery is likely to defend Mallya at forthcoming hearings in British courts.

India, it was reliably learned from a high level source, will adopt a strategy of trying to convince the British judiciary that Mallya committed fraud, so as to get him back to India. This was finalised at discussions between officials of India's Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Director of the Finance Ministry and Britain's Crown Prosecution Service lawyers in London.

In effect, what will be pursued is the CBI’s charge in India that Mallya, whose Kingfisher Airlines collapsed owing thousands of crores to various Indian banks, colluded with officials of IDBI Bank to obtain a loan of Rs 900 crore. The facility was allegedly granted despite the company’s “weak financial position and low credit rating”.

The extradition process between Britain and non-European Union countries, notwithstanding a 1993 treaty on the subject between the United Kingdom and

India, is long and tortuous. No absconder wanted by India under this agreement has involuntarily ever been repatriated by a British court, including people allegedly involved in acts of murder and terrorism.

Last year, Samirbhai Patel, said to be connected with the heinous 2002 Gujarat riots, returned of his own will. It is believed he did so thinking Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) governments at both Gujarat and the Centre may take a lenient view of his wrongdoing. This was indirectly an indictment of the present dispensation's human rights credentials.
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