Court allows banks to auction Vijay Mallya's properties to recover dues

New Delhi: A consortium of lenders led by the State Bank of India (SBI) will now be able to sell assets of fugitive businessman Vijay Mallya to recover loans given to Kingfisher Airlines.

The order regarding this was passed by a special PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) court allowing banks to sell certain real estate assets and securities to recover their debts.

Through an order on May 24, the court restored assets worth around Rs 4,233 crore. Tuesday's order related to assets worth Rs 1,411 crore. In both orders, the court held prima facie Mallya and his companies were involved in the falsification of accounts and funds misappropriation.

"The PMLA court has permitted banks to sell certain real estate properties and securities that belonged to disgraced tycoon Vijay Mallya to recover dues loan amount of over ₹ 5,600 crores. It was earlier under the Enforcement Directorate," said Mallikarjuna Rao, Managing Director, Punjab National Bank.

"Now the lead bank will sell those properties. PNB does not have much loan exposure in Kingfisher, but we will get our due share whatever once lead bank to realize," added Rao.

Mr Mallya is accused in a bank loan default case of over ₹ 9,000 crores involving his defunct Kingfisher Airlines and is presently in the United Kingdom.

Mr Mallya was declared a fugitive economic offender in January 2019 by a special court in Mumbai.

The 65-year-old has gone through and exhausted the full legal procedures available to him to fight the government's effort to extradite him to India to face charges of defrauding a consortium of banks of more than a billion dollars in relation to the collapse of Kingfisher Airlines in 2013.