Vijay Mallya on Monday resigned from the membership of the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of Indian Parliament, according to reports. In a letter from London, where the businessman has been residing after leaving India in the first week of March, he called it quits from being a Rajya Sabha member.
"I don't want my name and reputation to be further dragged in the mud and since recent events suggest that I will not get a fair trial or justice, I am hereby resigning as a member of the Rajya Sabha with immediate effect," the liquor baron said in his resignation letter, as reported by NDTV.
The Parliamentary Ethics Committee was scheduled to meet on Tuesday and was likely to expel the MP from the upper house.
An MP for 10 years, Mallya had claimed that there was no change in his net assets during his entire political stint, the Hindustan Times reported.
In his first interview to the media since leaving India, the businessman revealed on April 29 that he has no plans to leave the United Kingdom and that he was "in a forced exile."
On April 28, the ministry of external affairs (MEA) had written to the high commission of the UK in New Delhi requesting his deportation. Earlier the MEA revoked Mallya's passport and a Mumbai court issued a non-bailable warrant against him after he failed to appear before the Enforcement Directorate to join the probe in money-laundering case.
Mallya, who first made his foray into politics in early 2000s, was elected to the Rajya Sabha in 2002 as an independent member from his home state of Karnataka with the support of the Congress party and Janata Dal (Secular). In 2010, he was re-elected for a second term, this time with the backing of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the JD(S). His term comes to an end in July 2016.
A consortium of 17 lender banks have taken Mallya to the courts for defaulting on loans to the tune of Rs. 7,000 crore with regard to his now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines alone. His other concerns owe another Rs. 2,000 crore to the banks.
