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Most of the times in news I hear about someone doing some sort of crime and fleeing the nation and roaming freely in other nation. And the other country can't do any thing about it. What kind of BS is that?

I mean recently in this news this guy Vijay Mallya left India on 2 March after taking millions in loans and not paying it back fled the country.

Can't Indian government ask Interpol or any other authorities to take action over him and bring him to justice?

feetwet
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Stupid_Intern
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2 Answers2

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  1. Extradition treaties/agreements

The general principle of international law is that all countries are sovereign and have jurisdiction over all people within their borders; in this regard they are not required to render any persons within their borders to another country, not even to be prosecuted for a crime.

However, if the country the person is in has an extradition treaty or agreement with the country seeking to extradite them (in your case India) then the government may, in some circumstances, apprehend and render the person.

  1. Bars to extradition

Commonly, the crime for which the person is to be extradited may be a bar to extradition, either because it is not illegal in the country that would surrender the person, or because it is of certain natures (usually political crimes), or because of the penalty the crime attracts (death penalty, for instance).

As for this particular case, if I've read the news article correctly and that Mallya now resides in the UK, then there are extradition treaties between the UK and India and the subject could be extradited.

jimsug
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First, there must be an extradition treaty.

Second, between most countries, a person who gets extradited can only be convicted for the crimes in the extradition request. That sometimes causes a delay. In your case, Indian police might not be sure that they found all the crimes this person is guilty of. If they got an extradition today, they couldn't charge him with crimes they discover later. A bad situation if someone badly injured a person who might die from the injuries, but hasn't died yet. If they ask for extradition now, the criminal might not be convicted for murder if the victim dies later, so the police may wait.

You'd obviously try to flee to a country where there is no extradition treaty. No idea what the situation is between UK and India.

When a request for extradition is received, the question is: 1. Would it be a crime in the country receiving the request if the roles of the countries were exchanged? 2. Does the requesting country have enough evidence that the person would be taken to court in the receiving country? 3. Is there a guarantee of a fair trial, and no cruel or unusual punishment (for example death sentence, cutting off hands of a thief etc. ) and lastly is the crime significant enough, since the extradition itself would already be some kind of punishment.

And that kind of request takes time. If he fled nine days ago, there is no way that he could be already extradited. First the Indian police has to gather evidence that he actually committed a crime, ready to submit to the UK police. Nine days is probably not even enough to send the request. And as I said, if the police has evidence of four loans and gets him extradited, and then they find 20 more loans, they can't convict him for those if they are not part of the extradition request.

gnasher729
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