Vijay Mallya, the business tycoon who is currently facing various fraudulent charges in the UK has lost a major lawsuit filed by the Indian banks. The lawsuit seeks to collect more than USD 1.55 Billion or INR 1.04 Lakh Crores from Mallya.
UK High Court Judge Andrew Henshaw on Tuesday refused to overturn a worldwide order that was issued to freeze Mallya’s assets. The court upheld an Indian court’s ruling that a consortium of 13 Indian banks is entitled to recover dues from the businessman. Judge Henshaw ruled the judgment given by Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT) Karnataka, which states that Mallya owes the banks more than INR 9,000 Crores, can be legally registered in England.
Now that Vijay Mallya has lost the lawsuit, Indian banks have got the entitlement to enforce the Indian judgment and sell off his assets in England and Wales for recovering the dues. This worldwide freezing order prevents Mallya from removing any assets from the UK up to the value which is due. The order also prohibits from disposing of, deal with or diminish the value of his assets.
Owing to the assets freeze order, the business tycoon was asked to live on 5,000 pounds a week but his allowance was increased to 20,000 British Pounds a week, earlier this year. As per the banks’ lawyers, the accused businessman has disposed of Maybach 62 and Maybach 57 car models. Further, he also failed to disclose several cars that he owns namely Porsche Cayenne (£ 70,000), Range Rover (£60,000), Mini Cooper (£16,000), Ferrari F430 (£80,000) and a Bentley Turbo (£10,500).
The 62-year-old Mallya had left India in 2016 when banks attempted to recover the unpaid loans from his Kingfisher Airlines. Currently, a Court in London is hearing the case of Indian investigators for the extradition of the tycoon to face trial in India.
