Arun Jaitley makes veiled reference to Vijay Mallya in Budget speech

New legislation to be introduced to deal with economic offenders

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley made a veiled reference to Vijay Mallya during his budget speech. Jaitley said that there were many instances of economic offenders fleeing the country. He announced that his government would bring in a legislation to deal with such economic offenders. The new law would provide for the confiscation of assets of economic offenders who keep evading the law by escaping to foreign countries.

The government and the opposition have been involved in a bitter feud over Mallya. The BJP recently even dragged former PM Manmohan Singh into the controversy by claiming that the PMO helped Mallya in availing loans for his now defunct airline.

The Congress has also alleged in the past that it was the BJP government that allowed Mallya to flee India despite several cases against him. The now defunct Kingfisher Airlines owes 17 banks a sum of close to Rs 9000 crore including principal and interest.