ED draws up watertight case against Mallya

However, Rohatgi maintained that currently, there is no notice from the apex court, asking Mallya to come back to India and appear before the court in person.  

Rohatgi also said, “Mallya is not mandated to return and he should voluntarily surrender his passport. Vijay Mallya, is not mandated to return to India.” Although of the view that Mallya should voluntarily surrender his passport, he added, “Neither Mallya nor his companies have made any assurances to banks over the loans.”

The Attorney General said, “As far as the SC notice is concerned, the SC has not currently ordered him to appear in person. When the court issues notice in a civil matter, the usual presumption is that a party can appear in person or through a lawyer. It is up to Mallya whether he makes a personal appearance or not. But currently, there is no mandate that he should come himself. Probably a lawyer can appear,” he said. 

But Rohatgi has maintained his plea to Mallya for depositing his passport with the court. “This plea remains. We will renew our plea on the next date of hearing,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has written to 17 banks and a clutch of probe agencies with an aim to prepare a water-tight case against Mallya who is being probed for money laundering charges in the IDBI bank alleged loan fraud case. 

The agency is also understood to be mulling to take “legal action” in case Mallya does not present himself or produce valid reasons for absenting before agency investigators as scheduled on March 18 in Mumbai. Sources said as the post of regional chief of the agency is vacant at present in Mumbai, ED Director Karnal Singh will be personally monitoring the overall investigation in the case. Official sources said the agency has written to the 17 banks who lent money to the grounded Kingfisher Airlines and later went to the Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT) for recovery of these dues.

Also on Monday, the Ethics Committee of Rajya Sabha headed by Congress veteran Karan Singh on Monday took cognizance of the issue. “The question regarding Mallya was earlier raised in the House in the morning. 

The Chairman referred the matter to the Ethics Committee. Our meeting was decided earlier. There were two more issues. Now we have taken up this third issue as well. We have taken cognizance. Now we will proceed on it as per our rules,” said. When asked about the next meeting of the panel, the Congress leader said that a date has not been fixed as yet. “But meetings will happen,” he said.

Congress members in Rajya Sabha on Monday again raised the Mallya issue, and demanded that the industrialist be brought back to India, along with former IPL chief Lalit Modi. 

Congress members trooped in the Well and raised slogans half way through the Zero Hour after its member Pramod Tiwari brought up the issue. The party had raised the issue last week also. Tiwari contended that the liquor baron was elected to the Rajya Sabha with BJP support.

Hitting back at Congress for questioning whether the Centre would seek Vijay Mallya’s deportation, the BJP however, said the industrialist was a “Congress’ baby” and accused the previous UPA dispensation of helping him by forcing a bank to provide a loan of Rs 3,100 crore despite his company’s poor finances.