Solicitor General Tushar Mehta on Wednesday informed the Supreme Court that Rs 18,000 crore have been returned to the banks in the case of Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, and Mehul Choksi.
Mehta, representing the Centre, submitted before a bench headed by Justice A.M. Khanwilkar that the total proceeds of crimes in the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) cases pending before the top court amounts to Rs 67,000 crore.
“The Enforcement Directorate (ED) in the cases of Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi has managed to confiscate assets worth over ₹18,000 crore due to orders passed by the courts under (the) PMLA,” Mehta said.
In December Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said that as of July banks had recovered ₹13,109 crore after sale of assets belonging to the three.
At the time the latest tranche of recoveries was valued at ₹792 crore.
In April 2021, The British Home Secretary had approved of the path to Nirav Modi’s extradition to India wherein he is accused of money laundering related to his $2 Billion USD Punjab National Bank Scam. The other accused in the case Mehul Choksi is living in Antigua and Barbuda, where he has obtained citizenship against investment.
In July last year, the ED handed shares worth Rs 792 crores to a consortium of banks recovered from the above three wilful defaulters. In December 2021, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman while answering a question in the Parliament had announced that Rs. 13000 crore were already recovered from the asset sale of fugitive diamantaire Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi, and erstwhile liquor baron Vijay Mallya.
(With inputs from agencies)
