Fugitive diamond trader Mehul Choksi has been arrested in Dominica after he was reported missing early this week from his home in Antigua and Barbuda.
Who is Mehul Choksi?
The owner of Gitanjali Group, a retail jewellery company in India with over 4,000 stores, Mehul Choksi is also the uncle of Nirav Modi and one of the prime accused in the PNB scam.
Choksi and his nephew Nirav Modi are wanted in India for allegedly siphoning off Rs 13,500 crore of public money from the state-run Punjab National Bank (PNB) using letters of undertaking
What are the cases against Choksi?
In 2018, the CBI had first named Choksi and his firms including Gitanjali along with others based on a complaint received by PNB for alleged issuance of fraudulent LoU in their favour causing losses to the bank
ED also filed a complaint alleging that Choksi and others were involved in money-laundering
Choksi has been booked under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and other sections pertaining to cheating, the criminal conspiracy of the Indian Penal Code and relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act
Where is Mehul Choksi?
Fugitive diamantaire Mehul Choksi has been moved to the government quarantine facility in Dominica, according to sources on Sunday.
Photos of fugitive diamantaire #MehulChoksi in police custody in #Dominica
(photos – Antigua News Room)
– ANI pic.twitter.com/jw4FrmMR9O
— NewsMobile (@NewsMobileIndia) May 30, 2021
On Saturday, pictures of Choksi released by Antigua Newsroom showed him behind bars and with injuries on his hands and a swollen and bruised left eye. These were the first public pictures of Choksi, who had reportedly gone missing on Sunday (May 23) evening. He was later apprehended by Dominica Police on Wednesday and had been in their custody since then.
Efforts have been scaled up to bring back the fugitive businessman to India.
(With ANI Inputs)