India: Sahara bail plan in disarray

A RESCUE plan for India’s Sahara was thrown into disarray yesterday, when Spanish bank BBVA denied offering a credit line to the firm, scuppering the conglomerate’s claims it would use it to help secure bail for its jailed boss. Sahara, once one of the country’s most high-profile firms, told the Supreme Court this week that it had secured a e900 million (R11.6 billion) line of credit from BBVA, one of several financial deals it said it had struck. The court allowed Sahara three more months to raise bail. Sahara, a conglomerate whose assets range from Formula One to property and TV, has been trying to raise bail using its properties including Aamby Valley township outside Mumbai, which has luxury villas and a golf course. Sahara’s extravagant founder and boss Subrata Roy has been held in jail for more than a year, after Sahara failed to comply with a court order to refund billions of dollars to investors in a bond programme that was ruled illegal. Sahara has made several failed attempts to raise the bail money. The court has set Roy’s bail at $1.6bn (R18bn), a product of the cost of the bond programme, estimated by regulators to be as much as $7bn. Sahara has said it has paid most of the dues to the bondholders, but India’s markets regulator disputes that. – Reuters