Hinduja Family Found Guilty Of Exploiting Staff; Sentenced To Over 4 Years In Prison
On Friday, four members of the Hinduja family, Britain’s richest family, were convicted by the Swiss court for exploiting Indian staff at their luxurious Geneva mansion in Switzerland.
While the family was acquitted of human trafficking, the Swiss court convicted the elder Prakash Hinduja (78) and wife Kamal Hinduja (75) to a jail sentence of four and a half years. Their son and family scion, Ajay Hinduja, and his wife, Namrata, received four-year terms. The Hinduja family was not present in court.
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All four members of the family were found guilty of providing unauthorised employment, paying the Indian staff extremely low wages, a fraction of the standard rate in the country, to their domestic staff, forcing longer working hours, and confiscating their passports.
The Hinduja family’s business manager, Najib Ziazi, received a jail sentence of 18 months.
The sentences come amid allegations by the domestic staff of being forced to work long working hours with little to no vacation time, violating their contracts. They also alleged that the workers were forced to sleep in the basement and were rarely allowed to leave the house. Prosecutor Yves Bertossa alleged that the staff were paid in Indian currency, because of which they had no Swiss francs to spend in the country.
The prosecutor also stated that the family had spent 8,584 Swiss francs (or Rs 8.09 lakh) per year on their family dog, while one staff member was only paid seven Swiss francs (Rs 660) for an 18-hour workday, leading to exploitation charges.
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Prakash Hinduja is also facing charges of tax evasion of more than 125 million francs (Rs 1,169 crore) by Swiss authorities in 2007. The case is still pending.
The Hinduja family has denied all the allegations. According to reports, the family’s lawyers will appeal the Swiss court’s decision. Kamal Hinduja’s lawyer, Robert Assael, stated that the health of his clients was poor due to old age. He added that Kamal was in intensive care, with her family taking care of her.
The family’s fortune is estimated to be nearly 37 billion pounds ($47 billion).
