London: A UK court on Thursday extended till June 27 the remand of fugitive diamond merchant Nirav Modi, who is fighting his extradition to India in the nearly USD 2 billion Punjab National Bank (PNB) fraud and money laundering case.

The 48-year-old has been lodged at Wandsworth prison in south-west London since his third attempt at seeking bail was rejected by Chief Magistrate Emma Arbuthnot at the last hearing at Westminster Magistrates' Court earlier this month.

He was produced before Judge Arbuthnot for the first case management hearing in the case. The judge remanded him till June 27.

The judge also asked the Indian government to provide within 14 days the information on which prison he will be held at.

Modi was arrested by uniformed Scotland Yard officers on an extradition warrant from a Metro Bank branch in central London as he attempted to open a new bank account on March 19 and has been in prison since.

During subsequent hearings, Westminster Magistrates' Court was told that Modi was the "principal beneficiary" of the fraudulent issuance of letters of undertaking (LoUs) as part of a conspiracy to defraud PNB and then laundering the proceeds of crime.

Arbuthnot, the judge who had ordered the Mallya extradition in December 2018, has been very firm with the CPS, representing the Indian government, about proper indexing of all documents to be submitted to the court in relation to the case.

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Palghar (PTI): Police have arrested a man after seizing drugs valued at Rs 6.23 lakh from his possession in Maharashtra's Palghar district, officials said on Sunday.

Based on intelligence inputs, the police conducted a raid at Dhaniv Bagh in the Nalasopara area on December 4 and apprehended the man.

During a search, they recovered brown sugar valued at Rs 6 lakh and Nitrazepam (a psychotropic drug) tablets costing Rs 23,628 from his possession, a police release said.

The accused, identified as Salim Bagion alias Sardar Chacha (40), was arrested and booked under provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, the release said.

The accused is a habitual offender. He has 12 previous cases registered against him, including three under the NDPS Act, the police said.