India’s Supreme Court has agreed to drop criminal charges against billionaire brothers Nitin and Chetan Sandesara if they pay a third of their dues in a $1.6-billion bank fraud, a step that could prompt other offenders to seek similar settlements. After being accused of defaulting on domestic bank loans, the brothers, whose companies spanned industries from pharmaceuticals to energy, fled India in 2017 on Albanian passports, court filings showed. They denied wrongdoing.
The Supreme Court order, published on its website on Friday, is being reported for the first time. It quoted the brothers’ lawyer, Mukul Rohatgi, as saying they were agreeable to paying a settlement of $570 million, and set a December 17 deadline. Rohatgi told the court his client were ready to settle “to get rid of all proceedings”, the order said, and asked for all proceedings to be quashed.