Indian authorities have no grounds to extradite me from Britain,won't come back: Mallya

It took India close to 11 months to get the extradition process in motion from the date Mallya left the country on March 2.

Mallya also used social networking platform to slam Indian media. Photo: IANS

Liquor baron Vijay Mallya on Wednesday said that Indian authorities had no grounds to extradite him from Britain and he will not be coming back to India.

Mallya, who co-owns the Force India Formula One team, said that he has become a "political football" between the two major political parties of India, Reuters reported.

Quoting Mallya, who was speaking to Reuters during the launch of his team's 2017 car, said, "The government-owned banks are trying to hold me personally responsible for the failure of India's largest airline and to repay their debts."

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"Recovery of loans made to a PLC is a purely civil matter. The central bureau of investigation, at the behest of the government, converted it into a criminal matter. And then charges of defrauding banks and money-laundering appeared," Mallya said.

India wants Mallya to face legal trial after his now defunct airline Kingfisher Airlines defaulted on loan repayments worth over Rs 9000 crores.

State Bank of India on several occasions tried to auction off Mallya’s properties including his private jet, property in Vile Parle and Goa and cars among others. But failed to do so.

Last week, in a third attempt to bring Mallya back to India from UK, Ministry of External Affairs of India handed over a request for the liquor baron’s extradition to the British High Commission in New Delhi.

It took India close to 11 months to get the extradition process in motion from the date Mallya left the country on March 2.

As per the Reuters report, Mallya dismissed all the charges against him and said that 'not one rupee was misused'.

"I will be and am severely contesting all this, legally. I firmly believe they have absolutely no case against me whatsoever. I am safe in this country under UK laws, until proven otherwise. And I would rather be safe than sorry because I certainly do not want to be at the mercy of some maverick in the government of India," Mallya told Reuters.

Mallya also used social networking platform to slam Indian media. He tweeted "Very unfortunate that Indian media do not share pride that an Indian entry into Formula 1 is so successful. Only focussed on blasting me."

Very unfortunate that Indian media do not share pride that an Indian entry into Formula 1 is so successful. Only focussed on blasting me.

— Vijay Mallya (@TheVijayMallya) February 23, 2017

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