New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) claimed Thursday before a Delhi court that corporate lobbyist Deepak Talwar has links with fugitive Vijay Mallya in a money laundering case related to negotiations favouring foreign private airlines and causing loss to national carrier Air India.
The agency made the submissions before Special Judge Santosh Snehi Mann, who extended the custodial interrogation of Talwar till February 12 after the ED said he was to be confronted with his son Aditya Talwar who has been summoned for a February 11 grilling.
ED said it has to find out from Talwar the names of officials of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, National Aviation Company of India Ltd and Air India who favoured foreign airlines, including Qatar Airways, Emirates and Air Arabia, by making the national carrier give up its profit making routes and timings.
“Investigation has revealed Talwar’s links with fugitive Vijay Mallya, when both the said persons were evading the process of law and the probe of the said aspect is ongoing for determining the trail of the tainted money in the instant case,” ED’s special public prosecutor Nitesh Rana told the court.
Further custodial interrogation of the accused was required to unearth the facts within his special and personal knowledge, ED said.
“The investigation has revealed that various foreign airlines have paid huge amount of money in the accounts of Asia Field Ltd etc. whose ultimate beneficiary is Deepak Talwar and his son Aditya Talwar,” it said, adding that Deepak was not cooperating with the investigative agency and giving evasive replies.
The court had earlier allowed ED to quiz Talwar in custody for seven days, after the probe agency alleged that he acted as middleman in negotiations to favour foreign private airlines causing the loss to national carrier Air India.
Talwar has been charged with criminal conspiracy, forgery and under various other sections of the FCRA for allegedly diverting Rs 90.72 crore worth of foreign funds meant for ambulances and other articles received by his NGO from Europe’s leading missile manufacturing company.
Talwar was booked by the ED and the CBI in criminal cases of corruption, while the Income Tax Department charged him with tax evasion.
PTI