VVIP chopper: Court seeks Tihar's response on woman Dir's plea

A Delhi court has directed the Tihar Jail authorities to respond to a plea of a woman director of two Dubai-based firms, accused in a money laundering case connected with the Rs 3,600 crore VVIP chopper deal, claiming she was not getting proper treatment.
In her application before Special Judge Arvind Kumar, Shivani Saxena, an active director of Dubai-based M/s UHY Saxena and M/s Matrix Holdings, has submitted that she was suffering from various ailments.
Senior advocate Geeta Luthra, appearing for the accused, alleged that the medical report submitted by the doctor, on the directions of the court earlier, was "incomplete".

"Considering the facts and circumstances, jail superintendent is directed to authorise some medical officer along with complete medical records of the accused to appear in court on November 23," the judge said.
The court had on October 16 denied her bail, saying the allegations against her were serious.
The advocate appearing for Enforcement Directorate, N K Matta, had told the court that if granted the relief, she could flee from justice and hamper the ongoing probe. The ED had on September 13 filed a charge sheet against her and others.

Shivani Saxena and her husband Rajiv are residents of Palm Jumeirah in Dubai, an archipelago which is home to the most expensive properties in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the charge sheet claimed.

It alleged that the two Dubai-based firms were the entities "through which the proceeds of crime have been routed and further layered and integrated in buying the immovable properties/shares, among others" in this case.
The agency claimed that its probe had found that AgustaWestland, United Kingdom, had "paid an amount of Euro 58 million as kickbacks" through two Tunisia-based firms.
"These companies further siphoned off the said money in the name of consultancy contracts to M/s Interstellar Technologies Limited, Mauritius and others which were further transferred to M/s UHY Saxena and M/s Matrix Holdings Ltd, Dubai and others," the ED had alleged.

The agency had also arrested Delhi-based businessman Gautam Khaitan who is currently out on bail. It had registered a PMLA case in 2014 and named 21 people in its money laundering FIR.
On January 1, 2014, India had scrapped the contract with Finmeccanica's British subsidiary AgustaWestland for supplying 12 AW-101 VVIP choppers to the IAF over alleged breach of contractual obligations and charges of kickbacks of Rs 423 crore paid by it to secure the deal.