The High Court in London on Wednesday ordered diamond merchant Nirav Modi’s extradition to India to face charges of fraud and money laundering, amounting to an estimated USD 2 billion in the Punjab National Bank (PNB) loan scam case. Nirav Modi Closer to Extradition Loses Appeal in UK Court.
Nirav Modi and his uncle, Mehul Choksi, are the main accused in the Punjab National Bank scam and they both left India before the details of the fraud came to light on January 16, 2018. The UK court ruled that his suicide risk is not such that it would be either oppressive or unjust to extradite him to India.
Lord Justice Jeremy Stuart-Smith and Justice Robert Jay, who presided over the appeal hearing earlier this year, delivered the verdict. The 51-year-old businessman, who remains behind bars at Wandsworth prison in south-east London, had been granted permission to appeal against District Judge Sam Goozee’s Westminster Magistrates’ Court ruling in favour of extradition last February.
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The leave to appeal in the High Court was granted on two grounds – under Article 3 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) to hear arguments if it would “unjust or oppressive” to extradite Modi due to his mental state and Section 91 of the Extradition Act 2003, also related to mental ill health.
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