Ajay Hinduja, on trial for human trafficking in Switzerland, says nanny was like a 'second mother' to the family

Ajay Hinduja, scion of the billionaire Hinduja family, has dismissed allegations that he overworked an Indian nanny at his Swiss villa, saying she was like a “second mom” to his children, Bloomberg reported.

The development came as he testified on the first day of the Geneva trial after being accused of human trafficking and overworking domestic staff.

Hinduja, his wife Namrata and their parents Prakash and Kamal were all charged last year by Geneva prosecutors for allegedly making their employees work up to 18 hours a day without a day off at their villa overlooking Lake Geneva, according to the Bloomberg report.

The family allegedly confiscated their employees' passports and made them work on short-term tourist visas obtained repeatedly under false pretenses, according to prosecutors.

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“Anyone who would make an employee work that hard would be an idiot,” Ajay Hinduja told the court Monday. “She could not have done her job properly if she had worked 18 hours a day, 7 days a week.”

“I am shocked that someone we considered the second mother of our children could accuse us of something as humiliating as human trafficking,” he said later during the audience, according to Bloomberg.

Ajay Hinduja rejected the passport and visa accusation and said the employees had contracts approved by the Swiss embassy in India and their visas were regularly renewed by cantonal authorities in Geneva.

Judge Sabina Mascotto immediately refuted this characterization of the events, saying that checks had shown that the staff did not have the appropriate Swiss documents. Instead, they only had visas issued by France for the Schengen zone, the report said.

Schengen visas allow people to travel within Europe without passport checks.

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Ajay Hinduja said his staff were allowed to come and go from the house as they pleased, provided that at least one of them was at home at all times for security reasons.

Asked about their salaries, which prosecutors say never amounted to more than a few hundred Swiss francs a month, a fraction of the equivalent local salary, he said it was the Hinduja Group's human resources department. who took care of all the recruitment and contracts, not him.

On Monday evening, he said his lawyers and those of the three plaintiffs were “close to” reaching an agreement that would see staff withdraw their complaints. But even if things work out, that should still mean the criminal trial will go ahead, Bloomberg reported.

His only regret, he testified, was not becoming more involved in the running of the home after his parents were found guilty of minor offenses, having been reported to an employment tribunal in 2006.

“I regret not having analyzed the situation more closely,” he said, partly because he was very busy with his own work. “I had confidence” in our legal advisers, he said.

The trial only began on Monday after the Hindujas obtained a postponement, citing the parents' inability to travel due to poor health. The lawyers then requested that the judge be recused, citing alleged bias, and that the case be sent back for reconsideration. Both requests were rejected, Bloomberg reported.

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