Sebi bans Vijay Mallya from market for 3 years for rigging

MUMBAI: The markets regulator Sebi has barred fugitive businessman and ex-liquor baron Vijay Mallya from the securities markets for three years and also restrained him from associating with any listed firm for a similar period for routing funds to the securities market using his overseas bank accounts with the Swiss bank UBS.

The government has been attempting to extradite Mallya from the England to face fraud charges related to his now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines. Mallya has been living in the London since March 2016.

A Sebi investigation covering January 2006 to March 2008 has found that Mallya used Matterhorn Ventures, a foreign institutional investor, to secretly trade in the shares of his group companies–Herbertsons and United Spirits–by routing funds through various overseas accounts. United Spirits is now owned by the English liquor giant Diageo.

The former liquor baron routed money through various accounts with UBS to the market using Matterhorn. He used different overseas entities to hide his true identity, the probe has found. Matterhorn was wrongly listed as a non-promoter public shareholder in Herbertsons even though its 9.98 percent shareholding belonged to the promoter category, noted the order issued Friday.