Vijay Mallya's extradition hearing deferred to June 13

The hearing on the issue of embattled Indian tycoon Vijay Mallya's extradition from the UK has been deferred to June 13, Britain's Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has said.

The CPS will be arguing on behalf of the Indian authorities when the fugitive businessman's extradition case comes up for hearing at Westminster Magistrates' Court in London on June 13.

The hearing was earlier scheduled for May 17.

"The next hearing is June 13 for a case management hearing," a CPS spokesperson said yesterday.

A four-member joint CBI and Enforcement Directorate (ED) team had arrived in London earlier this month.

"Our aim is to build a strong, infallible case and these meetings will help resolve issues across the table. The CPS will be arguing based on documents provided by CBI and ED, therefore a joint team is here to address queries they may have, official sources had said.

Mallya, the 61-year-old chief of the erstwhile Kingfisher Airlines who owes over Rs 9,000 crore to various Indian banks, has been living in self-imposed exile in Britain since March last year.

He was arrested by Scotland Yard last month on fraud allegations, triggering an official extradition process in the British courts.

He attended a central London police station for his arrest and was released on conditional bail a few hours later after providing a bail bond worth 650,000 pounds, assuring the court of abiding by all conditions associated with extradition proceedings, such as the surrender of his passport and a ban on him possessing any travel documents.

-PTI