Willful defaulters must be punished: Yaswant Sinha

Amid probe against Vijay Mallya in the alleged loan fraud case, Former Union Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha today said willful defaulters having criminal intent should be dealt with strictly even as he advocated for stricter laws to deal with economic offences.
Speaking to Delhi MLAs as part of an orientation programme on the city's upcoming budget, Sinha, without naming Mallya, said such persons should be sent to jail.
"Willful defaulters, who lavishly spent money which they had taken in forms of loan from the banks, should be dealt with strictly. They did not have intention to repay their loans which later became non-performing asset," he said.

Sinha said laws dealing with economic offenses must be enforced strictly.
"We should strictly deal with such persons who had criminal intent. (We should) send them to jail as we did in normal cases..There is not only need for strict laws but also their early enforcement in the country," Sinha said.
Mallya is facing probe into loan default to the tune of Rs 9,000 crore.
Earlier in the day, Enforcement Directorate got probe reports from half-a-dozen banks, out of the total 17, in connection with its money laundering investigation in the IDBI bank loan default case against Mallya and others.

The agency is also mulling taking appropriate "legal action" in case Mallya does not present himself or produce valid reasons for absenting before agency investigators as scheduled on March 18 in Mumbai.