Vijay Mallya's lookout circular was amended from detain to inform in 41 days

New Delhi, Mar 11: The Central Bureau of Investigation amended the Lookout circular against Vijay Mallya within a month of issuing it. The first lookout circular was issued on October 12 2015 with the number DPBSM/2015/724/RCNSM 2015 E 0006.

However, on November 23 2015 an amended lookout circular was issued with the number 1049/RCBSM/2015/E0006.

Had the first lookout circular not been amended then Vijay Mallya could not have left the country. Mallya, however, in a series of tweets this morning clarified that he had not fled the country and would fully comply with the law of the land.

CBI flip-flop:

As per the contents of the first circular, the immigration authorities would have had to detain Mallya if he tried leaving the country. The amended one however states that only information is sufficient and there is no need to detain. Officials in the immigration say that as per the second circular they would always inform the CBI when Mallya was flying abroad.

Sources however say that the circular had to be changed since he had not been chargesheeted in any case. Although the CBI had questioned him thrice, there has not been any chargesheet filed in the case. There is also no court order which barred him from flying out of the country and hence the notice had to be amended a CBI official told OneIndia.

Mallya flew out of India on March 2 at 12.54 PM. He had attended the Rajya Sabha the previous day. As per the details available he boarded the Delhi-London Jet Airways flight 9W122.

Incidentally, this was the same day that the Debt Recovery Tribunal in Bengaluru had begun hearing a petition in which the banks sought a directive to Diageo not to disburse Rs 515 crore to Mallya.

Mallya had entered into an agreement with Diageo in which he would be paid Rs 515 crore if he stepped down from the UB group. It was referred to as a sweet heart deal in the media.

OneIndia News