Former Force India Owner Vijay Mallaya sentenced to prison
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Vijay Mallaya
Vijay Mallaya who was the protagonist behind bringing Force India into Formula One has been sentenced to prison after blatantly ignoring a court order.
The 66-year-old has been sentenced to a jail term of four months. On Monday, Mallaya was supposed to present himself in front of the Indian Supreme Court to disclose his assets after saying that he failed to make a loan payment.
However, after not being able to show up, has now been given a four months jail sentence. The Indian-origin Mallaya sold beer for years under the name Kingfisher and in 2007 decided to venture into the world of Formula One racing.
Mallaya bought the Spyker F1 team in 2007 and after that continued operating the team quite successfully in the sport. However, in 2019 the name was nowhere to be seen as it got to Racing Point. The reason behind the abrupt change was the fact that the Indians team went bankrupt amid allegations of fraud and misrepresentation.
The team was then bought by Lawrence Stroll and after going through another name change, is now known as Aston Martin Formula One team.
Force India had a decent run in Formula One
Ever since the arrival of the team in the sport, they were known as the underdogs as despite their low operating budget they were now and then able to challenge the top teams like Red Bull and Mercedes.
On the current F1 grid, Esteban Ocon and Sergio Perez are two names who used to drive for the team and the latter had a stretch of five years with them, after which he drove for another two years under the name racing point.
Mallaya moved to London in 2016 to escape punishment for the substantial debt that he was under and India previously many times tries to extradite him back but was not successful.
However, he has finally been given the jail sentence that was long due but after looking at the four-month period many people are dissatisfied.
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Rishabh Negi
(3244 Articles Published)