ED seeks revocation of Mallya’s passport

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday sought revocation of the passport of liquor baron Vijay Mallya, who has failed to appear before the agency thrice in connection with its money-laundering probe in the Rs 900-crore IDBI bank loan fraud case.

Officials said the agency has written to the Ministry of External Affairs to take action under the Passport Act, 1967 and ask the Regional Passport Office (RPO) here to revoke the diplomatic passport of the Rajya Sabha MP as he has turned out to be “un-cooperative” with its investigators probing the criminal case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) at its zonal office in Mumbai.

The agency, it is understood, has also cited various pending court cases against Mallya in connection with alleged loan de-frauds and dishonouring of cheques.

It is understood that Mallya left the country for the UK on March 2 using a diplomatic passport issued by the Delhi RPO to him by virtue of him being a sitting Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament.

The agency, sources said, while making the request has also informed that despite cooperating with Mallya thrice by way of providing him with fresh dates for personal appearance, the Investigating Officer (IO) of the case has only met with “non cooperation”, which is leading to a delay in taking the probe forward.

Under the Passport Act, when a person is issued a diplomatic passport their regular international travel document gets deposited. If the diplomatic passport is revoked the latter too gets cancelled.

They said once the ED request is okayed, the MEA will inform authorities in the UK about the same and seek his deportation to India.