Vijay Mallya offers to pay back banks, accuses CBI of witch hunt

Vijay Mallya

UK Court granted permission to appeal against an extradition order to Vijay Mallya on Tuesday. He took to micro-blogging site to laud the court's order and accused the CBI of witch hunt.

He wrote, "God is great. Justice prevails." Informing that he has been allowed to appeal against his extradition, Mallya added, " I always said the charges were false."

Mallya is facing fraud and money laundering charges worth Rs 9000 crores in India.

Mallya accused the CBI and said, "After all the mockery made of me I would respectfully ask those interested parties to focus on the Divisional Bench Judgement in England today allowing me to challenge the core of the false prima facie case filed against me by the CBI. Witch-hunt?"

A two-member bench of Justices George Leggatt and Andrew Popplewell of the Administrative Court division of the Royal Courts of Justice granted him permission to appeal against the order signed off by Home Secretary Sajid Javid.

While Clare Montgomery represented Mallya, there was no representation from the Home Secretary and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to argue for the government of India.

Mallya's counsel Montgomery told the court that her client would not receive a fair trial in India, be subjected to a "trial by media, and the judicial process would be coloured by political bias; the prison conditions in India would breach his basic human rights."

Seeking the court's permission to appeal against the order, Mallya's counsel also said that the Indian government did not have a prima facie case against him.

The 63-year-old former Kingfisher Airlines chief lost a "leave to appeal" in the UK High Court on paper on April 5 against the extradition order, leading to an oral hearing of his renewal application.

On April 11, he applied for an oral hearing to argue his case, which had been listed in a four-hour slot on Tuesday.

Mallya came with his son Siddharth and girlfriend and former Kingfisher Airline hostess Pinki Lalwani to the court.

Mallya, who flew out from India in March 2016, has been living in the United Kingdom since then. The Patiala House Court in New Delhi had already declared Mallya a proclaimed offender for evading summons in January 2018. The court had also issued an open-ended non-bailable warrant against him for evading summons and law of the land in 2017.

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Edited by mid-day online desk with inputs from Agencies