Creditors’ role in Nitin Desai’s death will be probed: Fadnavis

Mr. Fadnavis was responding to Bandra West MLA Ashish Shelar, who demanded that the ambit of the probe into Desai’s death be widened, and his demise not be treated only as a case of accidental death.

Maharashtra Home Minister Devendra Fadnavis on August 3 said the State government would probe the role of a private lending firm in connection with the death of acclaimed Bollywood art director Nitin Chandrakant Desai.

“Desai, through sheer talent, had done work to make the Marathi-speaking man proud. We will probe if creditors had applied pressure to take over Desai’s studio, whether he was under stress, or was any illicit interest applied in his case? While we cannot say today, the State government will also explore legal options on how Desai’s studio can be taken over,” Mr. Fadnavis said, adding all angles would be probed in the case.

Mr. Fadnavis was responding to Bandra West MLA Ashish Shelar, who demanded that the ambit of the probe into Desai’s death be widened, and his demise not be treated only as a case of accidental death.

Mr. Shelar said that Desai had taken a loan of ₹180 crore, which rose to ₹252 crore.

According to an insolvency petition filed in a bankruptcy court last week, Desai’s company had defaulted on a ₹252 crore loan to its financial creditor, ECL Finance, a leading Non-Banking Financial Company (NBFC) promoted by the Edelweiss Group.

“This brings the functioning of the lending system of [Indian businessman and CEO of Edelweiss group] Rashesh Shah and his Edelweiss company in the spotlight. Edelweiss ARC (asset reconstruction company) is behaving like a modern moneylender. While Nitin Desai took the extreme step and the Khalapur police have registered it as an ‘accidental death’, the ambit of the probe into his death ought to be widened to investigate how Edelweiss ARC operates, the methods of loan recovery, and their rates of interest. If need be, a special team ought to be constituted,” Mr. Shelar said.

Also read | Post-mortem report confirms art director Nitin Desai died due to hanging