The enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday summoned Vijay Mallya, owner of the grounded carrier Kingfisher Airlines in connection with a money laundering case registered by the agency against the company for alleged default of over Rs 900 crore loan from IDBI bank. The ED has asked Mallya to appear before it on March 18. Mallya, who is currently known to be in London, has a week to return to India. The ED on Friday also interrogated Ravi Nedungadi the former chief financial officer (CFO) and a close aide of Mallya and A Raghunathan the current CFO of the company for seven hours in connection with the loan default. The ED had on Thursday issued summons to over half a dozen officials of the IDBI Bank and Mallya-owned Kingfisher Airlines under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) wherein all the individuals have been asked to submit details about their personal finances and income tax returns (ITRs) of last five years to the investigators. “We had summoned Raghunathan and he appeared before us for questioning this morning,” said an ED official. “His questioning is important to throw light on various financial transactions, as many of them are in his personal domain,” he said. [related-post] According to the official, in his statement to the SFIO — recorded last month —, Raghunathan has blamed Mallya (for the financial crisis that befell KFA) and said he worked as per the directions from the latter. Apart from Raghunathan, summons have also been issued to former chairman and managing director of IDBI Bank, Yogesh Agarwal and other senior executive members and officials of both the organisations. On March 7, in a double whammy for the beleaguered Mallya, ED Mumbai lodged a case under PMLA while the Debt Recovery Tribunal in Bengaluru barred British alcoholic beverages giant Diageo from paying him a $75 million settlement till the pending case against him was disposed off. Meanwhile, caught in the controversy surrounding Mallya, British liquor giant Diageo on Friday was quoted by PTI as saying that it will “review” the Debt Recovery Tribunal’s order freezing $75-million payout to him out of which has already paid $40 million. Mallya has come under intense scrutiny in recent weeks after a sweetheart deal he inked with Diageo, the current controlling owner of United Spirits, under which he is getting Rs 515 crore ($75 million) to exit from the board of the company founded by his family and taken to the top by him. Staking its claim on this payout deal stuck by Mallya in a sweetheart deal with Diageo, top lender SBI had approached the Tribunal that earlier this week barred the beleaguered businessman from accessing this exit payment till the loan default case with the state-run bank was settled. With PTI
