This is similar to what happened in 2005 when the Government gave a clean chit to British authorities and allowed them to defreeze his Rs 21-crore accounts.

The latest move was confirmed to The Indian Express by diplomatic sources in Buenos Aires today who said, “The fact is that the Indian Government decided not to go ahead with the appeal and this led to Quattrocchi getting his travel documents back.”

Confirming this, Quattrocchi’s lawyer, Alejandro Freeland, told The Indian Express that last week, Indian Ambassador Pramathesh Rath handed over a “formal communication” to the Argentinian Foreign office asking to withdraw the Supreme Court appeal.

“I have not seen the communication,” said Freeland, “but once the Argentinian prosecutors were informed about the development, my client was called to the court in El Dorado and handed back his passport. The fact is that the Supreme Court appeal was withdrawn on authority of the Indian Government and the extradition case was over last week itself...After that my client spent the next few days saying goodbye to all his friends and lawyers and waited for the flight to take him home.”

Speaking to The Indian Express from Milan, Quattrocchi claimed he wasn’t aware of the circumstances in which his passport was returned. “I along with my friends and lawyers was waiting for the Supreme Court hearing when I was asked to appear before the judge in El Dorado to get my passport back.”

Quattrocchi had been detained at the Iguazu airport in Argentina’s Misiones province on February 6 on the basis of an Interpol Red Corner Notice and the CBI presented 250 pages of “evidence” in court. On June 9, a court in El Dorado rejected the CBI’s request for extradition.

In fact, last week, top CBI officials had claimed that an “automatic appeal” would be filed in the Supreme Court.

When questioned, CBI Director Vijay Shankar claimed he was “unaware” of the appeal being filed or withdrawn and was only informed this morning that Quattrocchi had got his passport back.

“Since the extradition request was turned down in June on technical grounds, the CBI had said there were sufficient grounds for appeal. I do not know what happened after that,” Shankar said, adding that he would now like to examine the Quattrocchi case “in totality” and that as far as the agency was concerned, he is an absconder wanted for trial in an Indian court.

While cheating is the only charge Quattrocchi faces, the agency has sent officials across the world to establish the trail of funds linked to his company’s account, AE Services, into which $7.34 million was diverted in 1986 as part of the alleged Bofors kickbacks.

Not good for great country to lose case: he rubs it in

Hours after he reached home, an elated Quattrocchi spoke to The Indian Express on telephone. He said his fourth grandchild was born when he was fighting his extradition case in Argentina and that the three-month old boy was at the Milan airport to receive him:

• “It is not good for a great country like India to draw a blank each time they press charges against a foreign national just like they did in Malaysia, in London by freezing my money and now in Argentina. You should advice the CBI to drop the case, there is nothing left against me and Indian courts have let off everyone else involved in the Bofors case.”

• “I don’t know what the legal costs will be but it will be substantial and my lawyers are working on it. I cannot go on spending money like this just because I was caught while on vacation on absolutely fabricated charges. After being dragged in a political controversy for 21 years, it is high time I am left alone in my country...”

• “I have nothing to fear. India is like a second home to me. I have spent the best years of my life in India and legal luminaries everywhere know there is nothing left in the Bofors case. It’s Indian courts which have given rulings that Rajiv Gandhi was not involved. The Hinduja brothers have been let off by Indian courts. So why am I being chased across the globe?”