During the hearing of Enforcement Directorate’s application to declare Nirav Modi a fugitive economic offender in the Punjab National Bank scam, Modi’s lawyer cited mob lynching incidents in the country as a reason for him to not come back to India.
Nirav Modi communicated to Enforcement Directorate through email that he cannot return to India citing security threat to his life.
V. Aggarwal, Nirav Modi’s lawyer, told media that his client expressed security concerns in emails to CBI and pointed out burning of his effigies, and mob lynching episodes in India.
“He has been made a poster boy of bank frauds for no reason. He also quoted incident of suicide of Mr Bansal due to CBI’s torture,” said the lawyer.
The lawyer argued that Nirav Modi left on valid passport and visa when his accounts were not NPA.
“There were fugitive proceedings in respect of Nirav Modi in PMLA court. ED seeks my client to be declared as fugitive on ground that he left India in suspicious circumstances. We argued he left on valid passport and visa when his accounts were not NPA,” he said.
The ED has claimed that Nirav Modi had refused to join the probe despite acknowledging emails and summons issued to him and that he doesn’t want to return to India.
“In a letter addressed to both the CBI and the ED, Modi had stated that he was not able to join the probe because of security threats (in India) from private persons, the families of those who have been detained (in the PNB case), landlords, the creditors who have not been paid and the customers whose jewellery was taken away by the ED,” he said.
The CBI had filed its first charge sheet in the Punjab National Bank financial scam worth over USD 2 billion in May.
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