How Media Mogul Stole $2.8million Aid and Killed His Step-daughter to Cover it Up (Photos)

 

A media mogul is behind bars in India accused of murdering his stepdaughter in an attempt to cover-up his alleged theft of millions of pounds of British foreign aid.

Peter Mukerjea and his wife Indrani are alleged to have syphoned off up to £90million from their television empire, which was set up with an estimated minimum of £2million from the Department for International Development (DFID).

Sheen Bora, 25, Mrs Mukerjea's daughter from a previous marriage, had intimate knowledge of the couple's financial affairs and offshore bank accounts.

She went missing in April 2012. The following month the charred remains of her body were found hidden deep in woods in a remote village in India.
 

She had been strangled. Detectives are investigating the allegation that she was killed to prevent her blowing the whistle on the offshore fraud. The focus of the investigation is now on suspected financial fraud.

In 2006 the Mukerjeas set up INX Television using money from a range of backers including a relatively new private equity fund called The New Silk Route (NSR).

NSR was founded by raising almost £1 billion from a variety of investors including the CDC, formerly the Commonwealth Development Corporation.

India's top law enforcement agency the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), suspect the Mukerjeas of taking swathes of money out of INX, including money that originated from DFID.

 

Mr Mukerjea, 61, was born in Bristol, the son of a doctor and began his career with Terence Conran's retail empire Storehouse.

His fortunes rocketed when he moved to Mumbai to work for Rupert Murdoch's Indian media giant Star TV where he was chief executive officer until 2007 when his wife set up INX.

Miss Bora, an executive with the Mumbai Metro transport system was the daughter of Mrs Mukerjea and her first husband Siddhartha Das.

Mrs Mukerjea's second husband Sanjeev Khanna and her driver are reported to have confessed to kidnapping and killing Miss Bora, allegedly under instructions from the Mukerjeas.

A CDC spokesman said: 'CDC takes extremely seriously any allegations about the misuse of its capital. There is no evidence that CDC's capital has been misused.'