Mehul Choksi must be deported to India, his request must not be heard: the Dominican government in court

Fugitive businessman Mehul Choksi must be deported to India and his plea for habeas corpus should not be heard, the Dominican government said at a plea trial.

The Dominican Public Prosecutor’s Office has filed before the Dominican High Court that the petition filed by Choksi was “unsustainable” and therefore “should not be heard,” according to India Today.

Choxi mysteriously disappeared from Antigua on May 23, and Dominican police arrested him for entering the country illegally. His legal team in Dominica filed a petition for habeas corpus and stressed that he was denied legal rights and that he was initially not allowed to meet with his lawyers.

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Choksi claimed that police officers resembling Antiguans and Indians abducted him from the port of Jolly in Antigua and Barbuda and took him to Dominica and tortured him. However, the police chief of Antigua and Barbuda denied the allegations of kidnapping and torture.

Choxi and his nephew Nirav Modi are wanted for allegedly sucking 13,700 kroner of public money from the state-owned Punjab National Bank (PNB). While Modi is in a London prison after being denied bail several times and challenging his extradition to India, Choksi received the Citizenship by Investment program in 2017 as a citizen of Antigua and Barbuda before escaping from India in the first week of January 2018.

A team consisting of officials from Indian agencies, including the CBI, has already arrived in Dominica to return Choksi if the court allows it.

Earlier today, Choxi’s wife Preet Choxi told India Today that he was ready to join the investigation, but Indian agencies were reluctant to investigate the case. She said Choxi should be sent back to Antigua from Dominica and that he does not want to return to India.

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