Page 46 - Seniors Today Dec 2019

Once Upon A Time | Stockmarket
Big Bull rules, still
Even 18 years after his death, market
maverick-turned-kingpin Harshad
Mehta has refused to fade into oblivion,
writes Anto T Joseph
More than a quarter of century after India’s
Bombay Stock Exchange was rattled with
a Rs5,000-crore Securities Scam, the Big
Bull Harshad Mehta, the market maverick-
turned-kingpin, has refused to fade into
oblivion. Running from one jail to another
and one court to another for nearly 9
years, Big Bull died at a young age of 47, on
December 31, 2001, still facing a barrage of
cases registered against him.
Eighteen years after his death, a special
court set up by the government exclusively
for the Securities Scam, is still dealing
with several civil matters, mostly related
to recovery of money. His brother Ashwin
Mehta, who did a degree in law in his mid-
50s, is a busy lawyer today practising in
Mumbai High Court as well as Supreme
Court. Most of the Mehta family, which
includedfour brothers and one sister, live
in Madhulika Apartment in Worli, where
Harshad Mehta used to livein his heyday.
Ashwin Mehta, just a year younger than
the eldest brother Harshad, fought several
court cases single-handedly, and paid
nearly Rs 1,700 crore to banks to clear his
brother’s name from the hall of shame.
When contacted by Seniors Today, Ashwin
refused to comment, saying the family
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never wanted to get into the limelight.
Another family member also echoed the
same sentiment. “Harshad is long gone.
During these nine years when he was alive,
none of the charges regarding swindling
of funds could be proved. After his death,
criminal cases were also watered down.
Supreme Court passed 10 judgements
but shut down many cases. There is no
complaint from banks pending now,” she
claimed.
Interestingly, though lower courts had
ordered the sale of Harshad’s flats in
Madhulika Apartments, the apex court
quashed them. The Mehta family stays in
nine flats in the same apartment, mostly on
one floor.
In February 2019, the income-tax tribunal
has also scrapped almost the entire tax
demand on Harshad, his wife Jyoti, and
brother Ashwin. The I-T Appellate Tribunal
(ITAT) deleted more than Rs 2,000 crore of
additions made by the tax department on
them for the assessment year 1992-93.
Born into a Gujarati Jain family at
Paneli Moti in Rajkot, Harshad spent his
childhood in Mumbai’s suburb of Kandivli,
where his father ran a small business.
After doing his B.Com from Mumbai’s Lala