Mehul Choksi claims he was abducted | Economic Times

Mehul Choksi, the diamond merchant wanted in India in the Rs 13,500 crore Punjab National Bank fraud case, claimed that his alleged abduction late last month was part of an “operation carried out by highly experienced mercenaries”.Choksi stated this in a complaint lodged with the police of Antigua and Barbuda. The island country’s Prime Minister, Gaston Browne, told a local media outlet that the police were probing the complaint filed by Choksi’s lawyer.Choksi went missing from Antigua on May 23, and was later found by the coast guard of Dominica, and has since been in the custody of the Caribbean island’s police in its capital of Roseau.In his five-page complaint, Choksi claimed that he was told by the “abductors” that he was brought in to give an interview “to a high-ranking Indian politician”.ET has seen a copy of the complaint, which claimed that his abductors had roped in a woman for the operation.According to it, Choksi was abducted in the evening of May 23 when he was visiting Barbara Jabarica, a neighbour at Jolly Harbour in Antigua with whom he was on “friendly terms for the past one year".“While conversing with her, there was a loud sound just behind us, and 8-10 heavily muscled men appeared from the entrance. They claimed to be Antiguan police and that they know all about me and have been watching me for a while,” the complaint said. “Ms Jabarica did not even attempt to help me or assist in any other way by calling for help. The manner in which Jabarica conducted herself … clearly points to the fact that she was an integral part of this entire scheme to kidnap me,” it added.He was taken in a small watercraft and later shifted to a much larger boat, by two “Indians” and three persons of “Caribbean descent”, the complaint said. “From the way that they had conducted themselves so far, the Indian men, they seemed to be highly experienced mercenaries, hired specifically for this purpose,” it claimed.Choksi alleged that these men robbed him of $1,500 and sought details of his offshore bank accounts. He was subjected to electric shocks on his hands, face and mouth and was told that his citizenship would be “fixed” in Dominica and he would soon be repatriated to India, the complaint claimed.Choksi said the men were constantly getting radio calls enquiring why the operation had not yet been completed. “They were getting harried as they were supposed to have handed me over to the authorities,” he claimed.When reached for comment, Choksi’s counsel in India Vijay Aggarwal told ET: “Truth and false both are five-letter words and not even a single letter is common. My client, by giving a detailed narration of events, has stated his truth. Now ‘false’ which was state-sponsored will get exposed if investigated honestly.”