AgustaWestland case: Accountant Rajiv Saxena brought to India for role in fraud

Rajiv Saxena, a Dubai-based accountant who is an accused in the VVIP chopper case, has been brought to India to face the law here, officials said on Wednesday. They said Saxena was brought to Delhi late evening after he was picked up by Dubai authorities early Wednesday.

He is expected to be handed over to the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which has been probing his role under money laundering charges. A co-accused and alleged middleman, in this case, British national Christian James Michel was extradited from Dubai to India in December last year. He is currently in judicial custody.

The ED had summoned Rajiv Saxena, a resident of Palm Jumeirah in Dubai, multiple times in the case and had arrested his wife Shivani Saxena from the Chennai airport in 2017. She is now out on bail. The ED had alleged that Rajiv Saxena, his wife and their two Dubai-based firms routed "the proceeds of crime and further layered and integrated into buying the immovable properties/shares among others".

The ED had named Rajiv Saxena in its charge sheet filed in this case and had got issued a non-bailable warrant against him. On January 1, 2014, India scrapped the contract with Finmeccanica's British subsidiary AgustaWestland for supplying 12 AW-101 VVIP choppers to the IAF over an alleged breach of contractual obligations and charges of kickbacks to the tune of Rs 423 crore paid by the firm for securing the deal.