AGENCY
Mumbai:The Enforcement Directorate (ED)on Saturday attached properties of the liquor baron Vijay Mallya, worth Rs 1,411 crore, in the IDBI Bank loan default case.
“We have attached properties worth Rs 1,411 crore (as per the market value) of Vijay Mallya and UB Limited under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act,” said an ED official.
The assets under “provisional attachment” included bank balance of Rs 34 crore, a flat each in Bengaluru and Mumbai (2,291 sqft and 1,300 sqft respectively), an industrial plot in Chennai (4.5 acres), a coffee plantation land in Coorg (28.75 acres) and residential and commercial constructed areas in UB CITY and Kingfisher Tower in Bengaluru (84,0279 sqft).
The attachment of properties is in connection with the Rs 900 crore loan fraud with the IDBI Bank. Mallya, whose defunct Kingfisher Airlines owes more than Rs 9,000 crore to various banks, left India on March 2.
The agency registered a money laundering case against him and others based on an FIR registered last year by the CBI.
It is also investigating financial structure of the Kingfisher Airlines and possible payment of kickbacks to secure loans.
It has also moved the special court here seeking to declare Mallya a proclaimed offender as the agency has virtually exhausted all legal remedies like seeking an Interpol arrest warrant and getting his passport revoked.
The ED is also seeking to invoke the India-United Kingdom Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) to have him extradited from Britain.PTI