Hasan Ali Khan

Hasan Ali Khan sounds straight out of a Bollywood masala script. Humble beginnings, claims of royalty, stud farms, horse racing, lavish parties, black money, Swiss bank accounts, and sleuths make up the ingredients of this story.

On 30 September the Supreme Court quashed the bail granted to Pune businessman Hasan Ali Khan by the Bombay High Court in a money laundering case.A bench headed by Justice Altamas Kabir allowed the plea of Enforcement Directorate (ED) which had approached the apex court challenging the 12 August High Court order granting bail to 58-year-old Khan.The 58 year old Pune-based stud farm was first investigated in 2007 for suspicion of money laundering. He was then arrested by India’s Directorate General of Economic Enforcement (ED) and dragged to court in July 2011. He was alleged to have financed international arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi on several occasions. However, Khan claimed that he was framed.[caption id="attachment_64028" align="alignleft" width="380" caption="Image from AFP"][/caption]India Today reported that the Centre on Tuesday withdrew the demand for the recall of the 4 July  Supreme Court order on black money and decided to settle for a mere modification of the direction to constitute a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe such cases.The move came on a day the apex court stayed the release of Hasan Ali Khan, who had been granted bail by the Bombay High Court in the money laundering case.Now, Irked by the absence of any senior central law officer during the hearing of Enforcement Directorate plea to cancel Hasan Ali Khan's bail in a money laundering case, the Supreme Court today threatened to vacate its stay on his bail.The court passed the order on a petition filed by the Enforcement Directorate challenging the high court's order granting bail to Khan, who has been accused in various money laundering cases.Hasan Ali was alleged to have stashed 8 billion dollars in Swiss banks. He has been investigated by the ED and the Income Tax  Department for some years now and his premises were raided in 2007. It was speculated then that the millions of dollars allegedly deposited by him in Swiss banks belonged to politicians and industrialists and that Khan was only a conduit who allegedly facilitated the transfer of the money from India, apparently on a commission basis.Khan has been declared the country's highest tax defaulter with dues allegedly over Rs. 50,000 croreThe Enforcement Directorate had sought details of Khan's accounts from Swiss banks in a letter issued in 2007. But the Swiss banks refused to share information on Hasan Ali Khan with the Indian investigating agencies. They cited a technical point saying not filing tax returns in India was not an offence under Swiss law.Hasan Ali’s story begins in Hyderabad. Ironically, he is the son of a Hyderabad excise officer. He is said to have entered the world of horse racing in the early 1990s while still in Hyderabad and then soon moved to racing in Mumbai and then Pune and other cities. He is said to have divorced his first wife whom he lived with in Hyderabad and moved to Pune after marrying his present wife, Rheema.