Fresh trouble for Vijay Mallya: CBI court issues non-bailable warrant against him

As part of the procedure, the agency last week moved a plea before the special CBI court seeking fresh non-bailable warrant against Mallya...

A week after filing the charge sheet in the IDBI loan default case, the Central Bureau of investigation (CBI) on Tuesday obtained a fresh non-bailable warrant against Vijay Mallya to facilitate the investigating agency to extradite him from the UK.

Beleaguered businessman Vijay Mallya (AFP photo)

The CBI had initiated probe against Mallya, Kingfisher Airlines and IDBI bank officials in 2015. On January 23, the CBI had arrested nine people, bank and Kingfisher Airlines officials, and filed a charge sheet against 11 accused the next day. Mallya was named as an absconder in the charge sheet.

As part of the procedure, the agency last week moved a plea before the special CBI court seeking fresh non-bailable warrant against Mallya. Special judge HS Mahajan on Tuesday accepted the chargesheet and allowed the plea for issuance of the warrant.

The court held that there is sufficient material against the accused to accept the charges and Mallya is absconding in the case. Hence, the court issued a non-bailable warrant against Mallya. The fresh warrant would now help the central agency to make a stronger case for his extradition.

On January 23, the CBI arrested former chairperson Yogesh Aggarwal and three former officials, BK Batra, SKV Srinivasan, and RS Sridhar, of the IDBI Bank along with four former executives of Kingfisher Airlines, former chief financial officer A Raghunathan, Shailesh Porkar, Amit Nadkarni and AC Shah. The accused were remanded in judicial custody after the CBI did not seek their custody. The court also heard the arguments on the bail plea of the accused and the next hearing has been scheduled for February 3.