Legal issues delaying Mallya extradition from UK, India tells top court

THE Indian government on Monday (18) told the country’s Supreme Court that it was “making all efforts” to extradite from the UK fugitive businessman Vijay Mallya (left), who is accused of defaulting on Indian bank loans, but added that legal issues were causing a delay.

A further hearing will be held on March 15, after solicitor general Tushar Mehta sought time to file report on Mallya’s extradition status.

The businessman is alleged to have defaulted on loans worth $1.4 billion (£1.03bn) relating to his defunct Kingfisher Airlines, but he denies wrongdoing.

On November 2 last year, the top court asked the Indian government to file a report in six weeks on confidential legal proceedings pending in the UK related to Mallya’s extradition to India. The previous month, the government had told the court he could not be extradited until a separate “secret” legal process in the UK, which was “judicial and confidential in nature is resolved”.

Mallya, who has been in the UK since March 2016, is on bail on an extradition warrant executed by Scotland Yard on April 18, 2017.

The Indian government said that following the refusal of leave to appeal in the UK, Mallya’s surrender to India should, in principle, have been completed within 28 days but “the UK Home Office intimated that there is a further legal issue which needs to be resolved before Vijay Mallya’s extradition may take place”.

A letter submitted to

the

court said, “In November 2020, foreign secretary Harshvardhan Shringla raised this issue with Priti Patel, UK home secretary, who said that UK’s legal complexities were preventing the quick extradition of Vijay Mallya.

“In December 2020, the external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar raised the issue with the UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab. Most recently in January 2021, the home secretary of India raised it with the UK permanent under secretary of Home. UK’s response remains the same.”