Mr Vijay Malliya, Mr Nirav Modi and Mr Lalit Modi are wonderful people, but are now fugitives having a wonderful time in different parts of the world. Once celebrated businessmen, now living abroad – mostly in England – to avoid laws catching them for the financial fraud they had committed in India. Their offences are non-payment of the money they had borrowed from different banks in India to run their businesses. Loans availed from banks and not repaid are a financial scam that deserves punishment.
Now the country is finding it difficult to bring them back to India and make them face the laws of the land, despite having sent a battery of capable lawyers to argue the cases. Even after having won, India finds it difficult to extradite them; the fugitives live there. One feels wealth accesses many escape routes often denied to the ordinary. These gentlemen are using all those holes to their advantage. Needless to say, they are still living there and enjoying a fabulous time. India could not extradite them.
It is anybody’s guess if they would ever be brought to India to face justice. But they have businesses in India and elsewhere and must be running those from there through their confidants.
It can be argued that this process is a waste of time and money. This gives rise to other opinions. What good would it serve to keep them in prisons? Other than financial crimes, they have no other charges. While incarceration symbolises justice and deterrence for the crimes committed, what good would it serve to keep them behind bars?
One school of thought is, why keep such persons behind bars? The idea may create controversy, but should justice mean incarnation only? Why not consider rehabilitation by asking them to repay the loans and to set up a business as penance for their prison term? Until a strong, decisive decision is made, these fugitives will not return, and the debate over how to bring financial fugitives to justice will continue.