CBI takes Christian Michel, the alleged middleman in the Rs 3,600-crore AgustaWestland VVIP chopper deal, to the Patiala House Court in New Delhi on Wednesday. Tribune photo: Mukesh Aggarwal
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, December 5
Patiala House Court remanded British national Christian Michel in Central Bureau of Investigation’s custody for five days on Wednesday over charges of corruption in the Rs 3,600-crore AgustaWestland VVIP chopper deal.
Michel is one of three suspected middlemen in a deal that both CBI and Enforcement Directorate are investigating for financial irregularities. Michel was extradited from Dubai late on Tuesday night and brought in for questioning.
Special CBI judge Arvind Kumar rejected Michel’s bail application on the ground that the case was complex.
Prosecution argued that CBI needed Michel’s custody to question him about the case, including details of possible kickbacks to senior politicians and officers, and to help them uncover a money trail.
Security was tightened at the Patiala House Court complex before Michel was brought in.
Around 15-20 personnel of the CRPF and 30 Delhi Police officials were deputed in the court complex as well as outside several of its gates, said one of the police officials.
Michel, 54, landed at the Indira Gandhi International Airport on a Gulfstream jet at 10.35 pm on Tuesday after which he was arrested by the CBI in connection with the case.
The other suspected middlemen being investigated are Guido Haschke and Carlo Gerosa.
Both CBI and ED had an Interpol red notice (RCN) issued against Michel after a court issued a non-bailable warrant against him.
The CBI has alleged there was an estimated loss of euro 398.21 million (approximately Rs 2,666 crore) to the exchequer in the deal that was signed on February 8, 2010 for the supply of VVIP choppers worth euro 556.262 million.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED), in its chargesheet filed against Michel in June 2016, had alleged that he received euro 30 million (about Rs 225 crore) from AgustaWestland.
The money was nothing but “kickbacks” paid by the firm to execute the 12-helicopter deal in favour of the firm in “guise of” genuine transactions for performing multiple work contracts in the country, according to the charge sheet.
The ED investigation found that remittances made by Michel through his Dubai-based firm Global Services to a media firm he floated in Delhi, along with two Indians, were made from the funds which he got from AgustaWestland through “criminal activity” and corruption being done in the chopper deal that led to the subsequent generation of proceeds of crime.
On January 1, 2014, India scrapped the contract with Italy-based Finmeccanica’s British subsidiary AgustaWestland for supplying 12 AW-101 VVIP choppers to the IAF over alleged breach of contractual obligations and charges of paying kickbacks of Rs 423 crore by it for securing the deal.
The CBI on September 1, 2017, had filed a charge sheet in the case in which Michel was named as one of the accused.
Former IAF chief SP Tyagi was also chargesheeted by the CBI in a Delhi court along with nine others in connection with a bribery case in the VVIP chopper deal.
Tyagi (73) is the first chief of the Indian Air Force to be chargesheeted in a corruption or a criminal case by the CBI and he has denied all charges against him.
Besides him, the agency has also chargesheeted retired Air Marshal JS Gujral along with eight others, including five foreign nationals, in the charge sheet filed before the Special CBI Judge.
Anglo-Italian company, AgustaWestland, is also one of the accused.
Others named in the charge sheet are—Tyagi’s cousin Sanjeev alias Julie, advocate Gautam Khaitan, alleged European middlemen Carlo Gerosa, Christian Michel, Guido Haschke, former AgustaWestland CEO Bruno Spagnolini and former Finmeccanica chairman Giuseppe Orsi.
They have been chargesheeted for offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act and the IPC in the case relating to the alleged bribery of Rs 450 crore.
Tyagi, who had retired in 2007, his cousin Sanjeev and Khaitan were arrested on December 9 last year by the CBI in the case. These accused are currently on bail.
Michel has denied the charges against him.
Meanwhile, when UK High Commission was asked about whether they had consular access to Michel, the commission’s spokesperson told The Tribune: “Our staff continues to support the family of a British man following his detention in the UAE. We are in contact with his family and the Emirati authorities regarding his case, and are urgently seeking information from the Indian authorities on his circumstances”. With PTI