On Saturday, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Christian Michel, the alleged middleman in the AgustaWestland VVIP chopper deal case. Reportedly, Christian Michel was produced before Special Judge Arvind Kumar where the ED sought his custody for 15 days.
After the agency sought his custodial interrogation, judge Arvind Kumar allowed the ED to interrogate Christian Michel inside the courtroom for 15 minutes.
Reportedly, ED also sought to arrest the British national in a money laundering case. Meanwhile, the court had reserved the order on Michel’s bail plea on December 19. On Saturday, the court has sent Christian Michel to judicial custody till December 28.
Notably, Christian Michel is among the three alleged middlemen being probed in the case by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the CBI. The others are Carlo Gerosa and Guido Haschke.
As per the allegations of CBI in this case, there was an estimated loss of Euro 398.21 million (about Rs 2,666 crore) to the exchequer in the deal that was signed on February 8, 2010 for the supply of VVIP choppers worth Euro 556.262 million. In the charge sheet filed against Christian Michel in June 2016, the ED had alleged that he received EUR 30 million (about Rs 225 crore) from AgustaWestland.
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