Lalit Modi may face Interpol notice

More trouble seems to be in store for former IPL chairman Lalit Modi with the Enforcement Directorate (ED) seeking an Interpol notice against him in connection with its probe in a money laundering case relating to alleged financial irregularities in the operations of various editions of the T-20 cricket tournament. The agency, sources said, is also mulling to seek extradition of Modi by sending a request in this regard to the ministry of external affairs (MEA) through the home ministry.

According to sources, Mumbai zone of the ED officially moved for a “Red Corner Notice” (RCN) against Modi on the basis of a non-bailable warrant (NBW) issued recently by a special court. The agency has sought the global notice, sources said, as domestic legal remedies to serve its earlier issued Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) notice on Modi had not met with any success even as the ED alleged that Modi did not cooperate with it in this probe till now.

The ED headquarters forwarded the legal request to the CBI here to get a notice issued through the latter’s Interpol wing. Sources in the CBI said the request has been received this afternoon from the ED and it will be processed after due verification. CBI is the nodal agency for Interpol related affairs in India. Modi is currently based in the United Kingdom.

“Once the RCN is sounded, the Interpol seeks to arrest the person concerned in any part of the world and notifies that country to take his or her custody for further action at their end,” sources said. The Enforcement Direc-torate had in July moved a special PMLA court in Mumbai seeking NBW against Modi after he did not respond to summons sent to him.

The ED is probing Modi, the Indian Premier League (IPL) and its executives under anti-money laundering laws under its criminal FIR registered in 2012 after taking cognisance of a cheating complaint filed by former BCCI chief N. Srinivasan against Modi and half a dozen others with the Chennai police.