India to press for Mallya's extradition at bilateral talks

Extradition of liquor baron Vijay Mallya is going to be top on the agenda when Union Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi meets his counterpart, second permanent secretary of UK, Patsy Wilkinson on Thursday.

A team of CBI-ED is already stationed in London to expedite Mallya's extradition for owing around Rs 9,000 crore to 17 banks of the country. Mallya had fled India on March 2, 2016.

India and the UK have an extradition treaty, signed in 1992, but so far only one extradition has taken place under the arrangement -- Samirbhai Vinubhai Patel, who was sent back to India last October to face trial in connection with his involvement in the post-Godhra riots of 2002.

However, unlike Mallya, he had submitted to the extradition order without legal challenge. India had given a formal extradition request for Mallya as per the extradition treaty between India and the UK through a note verbale, a diplomatic communication, on February 8.

Besides Mallya, there are nine other extradition requests pending with the UK — Rajesh Kapoor, Tiger Hanif, Atul Singh, Raj Kumar Patel, Jatinder Kumar Angurala, Asha Rani Angurala, Sanjeev Kumar Chawla, Shaik Sadiq and Ashok Malik.

India and Britain are also expected to discuss cooperation on international terrorism, organised crime and visa matters. The two countries are likely to extend agency-to-agency cooperation in matters related to international terrorism, particularly on the Islamic State's online propaganda. The issue of visas under different categories, including medical, tourism, business, is also expected to be taken up during the first home secretary level bilateral dialogue between the two countries.