Vijay Mallya has hit out at the Indian media, a day after his F1 team's 2017 car was revealed to the world.
The embattled businessman has high hopes for this season, rebuking Renault chief Cyril Abiteboul who doubts Force India can keep up with the pace of development amid F1's new technical regulations in 2017.
"Good luck to him. He might have to eat his words," team boss and co-owner Mallya said.
Some, however, might surmise that the 61-year-old former billionaire has an even bigger battle on his hands, as the Indian government moves to extradite him from Britain.
The Times of India newspaper reports that healthy talks about the extradition - with the government pursuing Mallya following the collapse of his airline - have already taken place with British authorities.
"Both sides reiterated their determination to strengthen legal cooperation and expedite the pending requests," the newspaper quoted a government source as saying.
Mallya, however, slammed the Indian press for focusing on the extradition rather than Force India's hopes of breaking into F1's top three teams as a smaller privateer in 2017.
"Very sad that Indian media do not share pride that an Indian entry in Formula 1.is so successful," he said on Twitter. (They are) only focused on blasting me."
Replies (8)
Login to replymclarenfan1968
Posts: 1,027
This theif should be behind bars.
CIRCUS37
Posts: 29
If you've absolutely no idea what you're talking about, please don't
mclarenfan1968
Posts: 1,027
I know plenty about what it's all about, You should read more world affairs rather be stuck in your little cocoon.
mclarenfan1968
Posts: 1,027
Time to school the likes of you on the internet who think they know everything before they mouth off.
Vajay Mallya ran his now defunct King Fisher Airlines taking loans off of public banks while getting his chums in the corrupt Indian political system to do him favors and write off massive debts. All of it Taxpayers money, hard earned money.
Indian currency suffers from high inflation and because of this their denominations are large very large. 500, 1000 Rupee notes are common and used like our euros or dollars by our American friends. Stuff can be as cheap as 5 Rupees while most things that are sold world wide costs into the millions of rupees, they call them Crores. The government of India introduced recently an overnight move to ban all 500Rupee and 1000 Rupees bills, all of this in the name of curbing corruption among the elite aka crooks. What really ended up happening was the common man, the poor man on the street who has no bank account to maintain but needs to pay daily transactions in 500RS and 1000Rs notes suddenly has a few paper notes with no value at all. To return it for a new note they need to establish a "source" if they cant not only do they lose their money they can end up behind bars. Thousands of people lining up at ATMs and other branches, some camping for days on end for notes. Many people have lost loved ones to illnesses because hospitals wouldn't treat until payment was made and some not even ready to accept old notes under government decree even on pure humanitarian basis.
All this crap going on but crooks like him who ate tax payer money gets to run away scot-free. If you think he didn't have help at the ports when he ran you are deluded. He paid his way out of the country and now the public wants him to answer for his gross abuse of the public money. He needs to be put behind bars for life, there is no way he can pay what he has eaten up in 10 life times.
LB
Posts: 6
Won't deny that he's a villain of the worst kind, just a little more info on the man - please - when schooling all us ignorants... He also owns United Breweries Group which is the dominant liquor/beer producer i India with over 50% of the total market!! One of UBG's products is the KingFisher Beer - hence the KingFisher decal on the engine cover of the VJM10. It's alleged that he owes a staggering 1.3bn$ (!!!!) in backtaxes!!!
calle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Its beyond me why they havent sorted this out already. If he has nothing to hide he'd clearly not be scared of returning to India.
bremgarten
Posts: 38
Well he could have access to a decent getaway car.
Vet5
Posts: 225
Fast & Furious: India Sprint