Indebted Indian tycoon quits as MP
NEW DEHLI • Beleaguered Indian liquor tycoon Vijay Mallya on Monday resigned as a lawmaker, even as a committee was preparing to expel him from Parliament over an unpaid billion-dollar bank loan.
The 60-year-old, a part-owner of the Force India Formula 1 team who used to run a liquor empire and Kingfisher Airlines, left India on Monday despite calls for his arrest and is believed to be in Britain.
A parliamentary ethics committee last week asked the two-time independent MP to explain his conduct, after it unanimously decided to expel him over huge bank debts.
He reportedly travelled to Britain on a diplomatic passport while a group of public banks chased him for US$1.43 billion (S$1.92 billion) in unpaid loans.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
3 held in India over brutal rape-murder
NEW DELHI • Indian police detained three people yesterday over the brutal rape and murder of a young student in a case echoing the 2012 gang-rape of a Delhi woman that sparked mass protests.
Police said the attack on the 30-year-old law student from the lowest Dalit caste was so vicious she was found lying dead in a pool of blood, with her intestines hanging out. Her mother discovered her body at the family home in the southern state of Kerala.
Kerala's Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala said police had registered a case of rape and murder and detained three people for questioning.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Search on for 4 after boat goes missing
KOTA KINABALU • Four people are missing for more than a day after their boat left Sabah's northern Pulau Balambangan for Tanjung Simpang Mengayau in Kudat district.
The Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) and marine police have dispatched six vessels to search for the boat that carried two Spaniards, a Chinese national and a Malaysian. An MMEA helicopter is expected to join the search today.
The MMEA Sabah and Labuan Region commander, Maritime First Admiral Mohd Zubil Mat Som, said the boat is believed to be adrift after its engine failed.
He said there is no indication of the four being abducted.
Their boat left Pulau Balambangan at about 6pm on Monday and was due to arrive in Tanjung Simpang Mengayau two hours later.
THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
