NEW DELHI: Days after he was found and later arrested in Dominica, the first pictures of India-born fugitive diamantaire
Mehul Choksi surfaced on Saturday showing him sustaining several injuries.
The pictures, supplied by the AntiguaNewsRoom, is showing him sustaining several injuries on his hands and the left eye which appeared bruised and swollen.
Posting the picture, the AniguaNewsRoom tweeted, "First pictures emerge of Mehul Choksi behind bars."
Meanwhile,
Antigua Prime Minister Gaston Browne said that a private jet currently at the Douglas-Charles Airport in Dominica is from India, Antigua media reported.
In an interview with
ANI on May 28, Choksi's Dominica-based lawyer Wayne Marsh had said that my client was abducted from Antigua on Sunday (May 23) and beaten up.
Picture courtesy: AntiguaNewsRoom"I noticed that he was severely beaten, his eyes were swollen and had several burnt marks on his body (apparently burnt by some electronic device). He reported to me that he was abducted at Jolly Harbour in Antigua and brought to Dominica by persons whom he believed to be Indian and Antiguan police on a vessel he described to be about 60-70 feet in length," Marsh told ANI.
Earlier, after taking note of submissions made in the Choksi's habeas corpus petition, the Eastern
Caribbean Supreme Court restrained
Dominican authorities from removing the fugitive diamantaire from the Commonwealth of Dominica until a further hearing in the matter which is scheduled on June 2.
Also, the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court, superior court for eastern Caribbean states including Commonwealth of Dominica, on Friday put a stay on his repatriation from Dominica.
A massive manhunt was launched after Choksi went missing and an Interpol Notice was issued by Antigua and Barbuda. He was traced and captured in Dominica on May 25.
Mehul Choksi and his nephew
Nirav Modi are wanted in India for allegedly siphoning off Rs 13,500 crore of public money from the state-run
Punjab National Bank (
PNB) using letters of undertaking.