‘SA is witch-hunting us’ — Wanted Gupta brothers get court green light to visit ailing mom in India

A regime change in South Africa sparked law enforcement agencies to witch-hunt them.

This is basically what Gupta brothers Rajesh and Atul have claimed to a court in India in a bid to see that they get to visit their ailing mother there without being detained in connection with certain matters linked to this country.

India has given the green light for them to visit for two months from this week.

Fugitives

Rajesh and Atul Gupta are wanted in South Africa in connection with State Capture crimes, including for fraud and money laundering.

In 2022 they were arrested in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Last year they managed to avoid being extradited from there to South Africa.

Read more in Daily Maverick: South Africa set to démarche UAE ambassador on Guptas’ extradition judgment failure

Around that time it emerged they had citizenship in Vanuatu.

In April this year, National Director of Public Prosecutions Shamila Batohi said South Africa was still trying to find out from the UAE what had gone wrong with its extradition request.

“We’ve been trying to … set up a meeting with the national director and the head of the prosecuting authority in the UAE in order for us to understand this,” she said.

“We’ve not been able to schedule that meeting for months.”

A Delhi High Court order, dated Tuesday, 28 May 2024, now provides some insight into what the fugitive Gupta brothers think of the legal action they face in this country.

It also points to where they likely are.



The Delhi High Court order relates to a Look Out Circular (LOC), which is effectively an alert that India uses to trace suspects.

Rajesh and Atul Gupta were listed as petitioners or applicants in the case.

Ageing ailing mother

It was submitted to the court that their 77-year-old mother “is a resident of Saharanpur, Uttarakhand, [and] is suffering from various health problems due to old age”.

The brothers therefore wanted the court “to suspend the operation” of the LOC.

This was “to enable them to fulfil the wishes of their mother to take her on a pilgrimage for the ‘Do Dham Yatra’ to ‘Kedarnath Dham’ and ‘Badrinath Dham’ that has recently been opened for a brief tenure”.

According to the court order, Rajesh and Atul Gupta’s legal representatives had submitted they had a “good case in their favour and are likely to succeed”.

SA’s regime change and ‘witch-hunting’

The order said the brothers wanted the LOC “quashed on grounds of applicants being innocent, [and] witch-hunting by the law enforcement agencies in Pretoria, South Africa, against the applicant and his family members due to change in regime in the said country”.

It referenced South Africa’s failed attempt to have them extradited from the UAE.

Read more in Daily Maverick: ‘A duplicitous game’ – UAE criticised after Guptas extradition request debacle

“The extradition petition filed by the South African authorities before UAE courts has already been rejected vide order dated 15.03.2023,” the Delhi court order said.

It concluded that the brothers would be “permitted to come to India for a period of 8 weeks from 27.05.2024 to 08.07.2024”.

The court order stated: “They would share their detailed itinerary with copies of e-tickets with respondents well in advance and would also apprise about their contact-address while in India for said duration.

“We clarify that they shall not be detained or arrested on the basis of LOC in question.”

Arrests in suicide case

Rajesh and Atul Gupta are not the only members of their family who are the focus of legal matters.

Last week it emerged that their brother Ajay Gupta, and his brother-in-law Anil Gupta, were detained in India in connection with a prominent builder’s suicide.

The builder, Satyendra Singh Sahni, also known as Baba Sahni, allegedly wrote a suicide note stating that he had been severely depressed because of ongoing threats and financial disputes with several businessmen, including Ajay and Anil.

Read more in Daily Maverick: Ajay and Anil Gupta arrested after alleged involvement in builder’s suicide in Dehradun, India – reports

It was widely reported in India that the duo would be kept behind bars for at least two weeks after their arrests.

The Gupta brothers – Ajay, Rajesh and Atul – also face problems linked to another country.

‘Hundreds of millions of dollars’

In 2019 the United States sanctioned them.

“Ajay, Atul, and Rajesh Gupta immigrated to South Africa in the 1990s, and due in large part to their generous donations to a political party and their reportedly close relationship with former South African President Jacob Zuma, their business interests expanded,” a US Treasury statement said at the time.

“The family has been implicated in several corrupt schemes in South Africa, allegedly stealing hundreds of millions of dollars through illegal deals with the South African government, obfuscated by a shadowy network of shell companies and associates linked to the family.”

It was previously reported that Department of Justice spokesperson Chrispin Phiri said as far as the Department was aware, the fugitive brothers were in Dubai. However, unattributed media reports from the past year have located Atul and Rajesh in Switzerland, the Central African Republic, Cameroon and Vanuatu. He was speaking at speaking at Daily Maverick’s The Gathering in March 2024, DM