Finally, some of the Kingfisher “ghosts” are getting paid. And then the Enforcement Directorate (ED) dropped the news on Thursday—over ₹300 crore is finally heading back to the former employees of Vijay Mallya’s defunct airline.
The thing is, these workers have been waiting for years. Literally over a decade for some. This isn’t just a drop in the bucket; it’s ₹311.67 crore that was sitting in an asset pool from sold shares that the ED had previously clawed back.
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The Paperwork and the Payout
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The Mechanism: The money came from the sale of attached shares. The ED had already given these to the State Bank of India (SBI) under the PMLA rules.
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The Order: The Chennai Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT) issued an order on December 12. And then the funds were cleared for release.
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The Priority: Usually, banks (the secured creditors) fight to be first in line to get their cash back. But here’s the kicker: SBI actually coordinated with the ED and told the tribunal that the workers’ dues should take priority. Let’s be real, that’s a rare win for the little guy.
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The Global Fugitive Context
Vijay Mallya is still sitting in London. He’s been a “fugitive economic offender” since 2019. The CBI and ED have been chasing him for years over that massive loan fraud case.
So far, the ED has restituted a staggering ₹14,132 crore in properties to SBI. This latest chunk for the workers is just a small slice of the total assets they’ve managed to freeze or sell.
The official liquidator is the one who will actually cut the checks to the former employees. It’s about time. Those workers were left high and dry when the “King of Good Times” took off. It’s an ongoing process of cleaning up one of the messiest bankruptcies in Indian history, or nothing.
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