Mallya lives in £11.5 million mansion in UK: Report

London, April 24

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Indian liquor baron Vijay Mallya, who has been accused of having fled the country as he faced pressure to pay unpaid loans of Rs 9,000 crore and now faces legal proceedings, owns a 11.5-million-pound (Rs 105,61,21,507) mansion that was bought from the father of British Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton by a company with offshore links, a media report said on Sunday.

The 60-year-old, who claims he did no wrong and denies accusations of having deliberately left to escape law, has been living at a three-storey mansion called Ladywalk in the village of Tewin in Hertfordshire, just over a one-hour drive north of London.

A report in 'The Sunday Times' claimed Mallya confirmed that his " official address in the UK is at Ladywalk", adding that he had supplied this information to the Indian authorities.

"The ownership structure of Ladywalk is perfectly legal," the newspaper quoted Mallya as saying.

The use of companies with offshore links to buy properties in Britain has come under increasing scrutiny as the practice can allow the real owner or beneficiary to remain hidden — sometimes for tax purposes.

Such companies collectively hold up to 170 billion pounds of UK property, much of it in London and the home counties.

British Prime Minister David Cameron is set to use an anti-corruption summit next month to demand more transparency on such future purchases.

Mallya however told the newspaper there was no "concealment or tax avoidance involved" and said that he has been a "British resident" since 1992.

The report notes that official documents list the owner of Ladywalk as a limited liability partnership called Ladywalk LLP.

It has two members, including a company called Continental Administration Services, which is registered in St. Kitts and Nevis, a Commonwealth country in the Caribbean regarded as a tax haven.

A loan to finance the property purchase in July 2015 was made by the Edmond de Rothschild private bank in Switzerland.

Official papers name the borrower as Ladywalk Investments, a company incorporated in the British Virgin Islands, another tax haven.

The report also claims that his name appears on the electoral rolls in the UK with his country home in Britain as his recorded address.

Once dubbed the ‘King of Good Times’, Mallya faces legal action after some 17 banks approached India’s Supreme Court to get back unpaid loans, extended to Kingfisher Airlines. Mallya left the country on March 2, leaving banks struggling to get back their money.

Several agencies are currently investigating various allegations of loan default and fraud against the businessman. A court in Mumbai issued a non-bailable warrant against him for fraud in getting the IDBI bank to extend loans to the company. 

Mallya has described an arrest warrant against him as "erroneous and unjustified" and has recently tweeted: "I fully respect and will comply with the law of the land".

His passport, which had been suspended earlier, was also revoked on Sunday.

Kingfisher Airlines buckled under mounting debt to finally fold up its operations in March 2012.  — PTI

(1.00 GBP = 96.015784 INR)