Lawyer Mehmood M Abdi objects to Lalit Modi being called an offender

MUMBAI: Defending Lalit Modi to the hilt, his lawyer Mehmood M Abdi today took serious objecton to calling the former IPL commissioner an " offender" since no court of law has declared him so.

Lashing out at those using terms like "fugitive" and "offender" to describe Lalit Modi, he told a press meet that these were legal terms and can not be used too "loosely".

"It has to be decided by law. Which court has decided that Lalit Modi as offender and fugitive? He stays within knowledge of everyone in the United Kingdom," he said.

Stating that no blue corner notice was ever issued against Lalit Modi, he said "non-issues have been blown out of proportion."

Defending Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj, he said she had done only her duty and sought to know how cold someone be blamed for intervening on humanitarian grounds.

Seeking to turn the tables on Congress, he said Lalit Modi's passport case was argued in UPA's period and hence there is no conflict of interest though the final order came after the government change (last year).

Abdi claimed that in an RTI reply received on June 2010, it was said that Dawood Ibrahim group was monitoring the movement of Lalit Modi and were also following his daughter.

In May 2010 his security was withdrawn after which he left for the UK, he said.