Tirath Hassaram Khemlani — biographical timeline

Last updated 10 July 2026 (second verification pass against Historic Hansard day-pages, the London Gazette, the ADB, the Order-of-Australia gazettal, the WikiLeaks cables and the Book of Leaks page photos; ~20 corrections, noted in place) — research compiled by Richard Bean with extensive Claude/Sonnet+Opus research support, drawing on:

• User-supplied research files (Khemlani.eml and its many .eml attachments; PAC-10194523-khemlani-link-with-nugan-hand.pdf = Marian Wilkinson, The National Times, 15–21 Nov 1985, pp. 20 & 22; IMG_8302/8302-2/8303/8304/8306.heic = pp. 70–75 of Brian Toohey & Marian Wilkinson, The Book of Leaks: Exposes in Defence of the Public’s Right to Know (Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1987), ISBN 9780207155086).
• Wayne Reynolds’s entry on Khemlani in the Australian Dictionary of Biography / Obituaries Australia.
• Denis Freney, Get Gough! How the CIA & Rupert Murdoch overthrew Gough Whitlam (Tribune special, October 1985), Ch. 2 “The Khemlani Affair”, pp. 5–11 — the densest single secondary account, with much of the FBI / Mafia / Haiti / Macwell / Hong-Kong-1983 detail. Full text on archive.org.
• Jonathan Kwitny, “The Great Dingo Hunt”, Mother Jones Feb–Mar 1984, p.67 (the article expanded into the Australian chapters of The Crimes of Patriots, Norton 1987); and Kwitny, “The CIA’s Hidden Hand in Down Under”, Foreign Policy No. 49 (Winter 1982–83) p.199.
• Gough Whitlam, The Truth of the Matter (Penguin 1979) p.222, and 1983 reprint p.230.
• Michael Sexton, Illusions of Power: The Fate of a Reform Government (Allen & Unwin 1979) p.334.
• Paul Kelly, The Dismissal (Angus & Robertson 1983) p.374 — reissue of The Unmaking of Gough (1976).
• Bruce Page, The Murdoch Archipelago (2003).
• John Pilger, A Secret Country (Knopf 1989/1990).
• Tom Uren, Straight Left (1995), pp. 236–7.
• Shaun Carney, Australian Moment (2012), p.67.
• Gavin Souter, Acts of Parliament: A Narrative History of the Senate and House of Representatives, Commonwealth of Australia (Melbourne University Press, 1988), p.714 — Wheeler/Whitlam dialogue. (An earlier draft of this file misattributed the book to Lionel Bowen; Souter is the author.)
• Coxsedge, Coldicutt & Harant, Rooted in Secrecy: The Clandestine Element in Australian Politics (Committee for the Abolition of Political Police, 1982), pp. 40 & 237 & 262.
• Harry Gordon, An Eyewitness History of Australia (Penguin 1988) p.510, reprinting Peter Game’s Melbourne Herald dispatch.
• Laurie Oakes, Crash Through or Crash (1976) p.135.
• Geoffrey Bolton, Oxford History of Australia, Vol. 5, p.374.
• Coral Bell, Dependent Ally (the “K1/K2/K3” Treasury naming convention) p.250.
• The Australian Dictionary of Biography (adb.anu.edu.au/biography/khemlani-tirath-hassaram-23551); the Canberra Times obituary of 13 September 1991 reproduced on Obituaries Australia.
• The Trove digitised newspaper corpus (National Library of Australia) — usable URLs noted; the trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/<id> form was accessed directly.
• Historic Hansard (search.historichansard.net) — 282 fragment hits for “Khemlani” 1975–80, distilled below.
• The National Archives of Australia (NAA) Fact Sheet 239, which itemises NAA file series A1209, A8446, A432, A571, A1573 (Commonwealth records) and M3865, M1567, M4081 (Clyde Cameron’s, Cairns’s and Harders’s personal papers) on the Loans Affair.
• WikiLeaks PlusD — ≈20 declassified US State Dept cables on Khemlani / the Loans Affair / the Iraqi Breakfast affair / ONACORA (1975–1979); listed below.
• The London/Edinburgh Gazette (open-access full PDF), TNA HO 334/871/35287 (naturalisation), UK Companies House (K B (Import & Export) Limited 01490164), the New Straits Times (Singapore) Google News Archive for the 24 May 1974 Thomas Simson & Co notice.
• Modern reconstructions of the adjacent Iraqi Breakfast affair — Suzanne Rutland (AJHS Journal 22(2), 2015), Philip Dorling (Fairfax 2012, Narooma News reprint), Troy Bramston (Quadrant March 2016 and April 2024), Rodney Tiffen (“Rupert Murdoch’s greatest scoop”, Pearls and Irritations, 12 Sept 2025; republished as “Best of 2025”, 7 Jan 2026 — an earlier draft of this file wrongly bylined this piece “Bowman & Stine”).

This file is intended as raw material for a future, properly footnoted Wikipedia article (currently the Wikipedia title Tirath Khemlani redirects to Loans affair and Khemlani has never had a stand-alone article). The user’s nine talk-page questions are answered explicitly in the second half.

Note on names. “Khemlani” is a Sindhi (Bhaiband) clan surname; “Hassaram” is a patronymic (“son of Hassaram”); “Khemchand” is the Sindhi maternal surname (his mother was Hemibai née Khemchand). Use of both the patronymic and the clan surname interchangeably is a major reason the documentary trail is so broken, and it explains why anyone searching UK / Singapore / FBI / Companies House records under “Khemlani” alone in 1974–75 would have missed almost everything — UK records up to 1974 were almost all under “Hassaram” or “Tirathdas Hassaram”.

Names and aliases (assembled answer to question 8)

Linked alias (probable brother): Gobind Hassamal Dalamal — by Deed Poll 20 April 1970 he abandoned the surname Ramnani (London Gazette 8 May 1970). Gobind Dalamal was 2nd defendant alongside Khemlani in the February 1976 London Chancery writ.

Probable Khemlani-clan kinship (Manchester branch — not Tirath himself): Tirthdas Khemchand Khemlani (b. March 1928), with Shoba Khemlani (b. May 1932) and three sons Sunder (b. Dec 1955), Ramesh (b. May 1957), Mohan (b. April 1958), all directors of K B (Import & Export) Limited, UK company 01490164, incorporated 10 April 1980. The middle name “Khemchand” matches Tirath’s mother’s maiden surname (Hemibai née Khemchand), so Tirthdas Khemchand is most likely a younger maternal cousin. Tirthdas Khemchand resigned as director on 5 November 2004. “K B” almost certainly stands for “Khemlani Brothers”.

Chronological timeline

Origins and pre-Loans-affair career (1920 – Nov 1974)

• 12 September 1920 — Birthdate on UK naturalisation certificate R1/35287. 17 September 1920 — Birthdate given by the ADB. Both sources agree on the year. Place: Sindh, British India (now Pakistan); some 1975 Embassy traffic erroneously says “born in Singapore” (cable 1975CANBER04389). Father Hassaram Ganggaram, textile manufacturer; mother Hemibai née Khemchand (ADB).
• c. 1940s — Arranged first marriage to Somar; daughter Shanti and two sons born (ADB).
• 1950 — First marriage ended. Migrated to Britain; studied textiles in Scotland and traded as importer/wholesaler of shirts (ADB). One ADB-quoted source says he studied textiles at Leeds.
• Until November 1958 — Employed by K. Chellaram and Sons (London) Ltd — a major Sindhi textile-trading house, with branches in Nigeria, Hong Kong, Indonesia (Wikipedia: Kishinchand Chellaram). This is the route by which Khemlani most likely reached Singapore / Hong Kong / Manchester before settling in Glasgow.
• 1956 — Founded The Castle Manufacturing Company in Glasgow.
• November 1958 — Left Chellaram, went full-time at Castle Manufacturing; doing business with J. Vaughan & Co Ltd, Stockwell Street, Glasgow (warehousemen, textiles).
• January 1959 — Fire at J. Vaughan & Co’s Edinburgh premises (later revealed as arson / insurance fraud). Hassaram subsequently “prepared 23 invoices as if the goods had been delivered, but in point of fact they had not been delivered” — his own trial testimony, 1964.
• 12 April 1961 — Naturalised as a British subject, certificate R1/35287 (TNA, HO 334/871/35287), Home Office reference H 93811, in the name Tirathdas Hassaram, “Country of Nationality or Birth: India; City or Town: Sindh.” This is the canonical original-name document.
• April 1964 — T. Hassaram & Co Ltd / Castle Manufacturing Co in compulsory liquidation; meeting of creditors at Mann Judd Gordon & Co, 142 St Vincent Street, Glasgow, 17 April 1964 (Edinburgh Gazette).
• 11 May 1964 — Witness for the prosecution at the High Court of Glasgow in HMA v Andrew Sirel Maxwell and Thomas Shaw (directors of J. Vaughan & Co). Reported in Evening Times, Glasgow: “Tirath Hassaram, 43-year-old, Indian-born Glasgow importer and exporter, now a British subject, admitted he knew that by doing this he was helping the firm to collect ‘more money’ from the insurance company than they would have done.” Address given as 37 Stonefield Drive, Paisley.
• 12 May 1964 — Glasgow Herald: detailed account quoting Hassaram on the warehouse stock-value discrepancy (£54,246 claim; ~£19,201 actually in warehouse).
• 1964 (Scottish bankruptcy) — Per Denis Freney 1985, citing The Australian of 17 October 1975: “he had been declared a bankrupt in Scotland in 1964 and was undischarged in 1975.” This appears to be a separate Scottish personal-bankruptcy proceeding linked to the Castle Manufacturing / T. Hassaram & Co liquidation, distinct from the later 1971 English bankruptcy.
• 25 May 1966 — Further creditors’ meeting on T. Hassaram & Co (David Flint, Official Liquidator).
• 22 July 1968 — Khemlani & Company Limited of 71 Cheetham Hill Road, Manchester 4 (Export, Import and Emigration Agents) put into members’ voluntary winding-up; Liquidator: Leslie Harry Shipton (London Gazette).
• 14 November 1968 — Second marriage at Paisley registrar’s office to Sarah Ann Lambe (tearoom manageress). He used the name Hassaram on the certificate (ADB).
• 20 April 1970 — Gobind Hassamal Ramnani changed name to Gobind Hassamal Dalamal by Deed Poll, enrolled in the Supreme Court of Judicature 20 April 1970 (London Gazette).
• 23 June 1971 — Bankruptcy petition filed against him in the High Court of Justice as HASSARAM, Tirath (male), of 74–76 Old Compton Street, London W.1, MERCHANT — Matter 855 of 1971 (London Gazette, 11 November 1971, Issue 45518, p.12293 — the Gazette’s own issue metadata gives 11 November, not 19 November as an earlier draft of this file had).
• 5 November 1971 — Receiving Order 1171.
• 30 November 1971 — First meeting of creditors, Thomas More Building, RCJ.
• 3 December 1971 — Adjudication Order; address by this time 50 Popes Lane, London W.5, “Sales Representative”.
• 8 December 1971 — Public Examination, Court 46, Queen’s Building, RCJ.
• 1965–1974 — “nine years as a freelance commodities dealer” — Khemlani told Peter Game in October 1975 he had spent the period “barely breaking even” (Sydney Sun, 9 Oct 1975, quoted by Freney). Per Freney 1985 p.5: “From 1965 to 1974, Khemlani spent much of his time working in newly-independent Africa, trying to arrange deals of oil, sugar, cement and dozens of other commodities. He was one of the new breed of carpet-baggers who descended on Africa. While there is no concrete evidence that Khemlani was involved in arms dealing during this period, it would be strange if he were not. Freelance commodity dealers like Khemlani regarded arms as just another commodity, but one from which quite spectacular profits could be made.” This West-African freelance career is the most plausible explanation of how Khemlani later obtained Ghanaian and Sierra Leonean passports/credentials.
• 1973–74 (about six months before Connor) — Becomes manager of the commodities division at Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) Ltd, London (incorporated capital £100, name confusingly close to the wealthy/respectable Dalamal & Sons of London / West Africa / Middle East — a real Sindhi trading family). Office address: 8 West Eaton Place, London SW1 (Belgravia). London press described his “real” office, however, as in the basement of a Bulgarian tavern (per The Age, 23 May 1975, p.1) — i.e. a different, much shabbier London location.
• 24 May 1974 — Public notice in the New Straits Times (Singapore) “By Order of the Board, A. Withnall, Secretary” of Thomas Simson & Co. Ltd., London: “TIRATH HASSARAM, also known as T.H. KHEMLANI, also known as PETER KHEMLANI … has no authority whatsoever from Thomas Simson & Co. Ltd. to act or to engage Thomas Simson & Co. Ltd. … in any contractual obligations of whatever nature.” This is the earliest documentary use of all three names side-by-side and is a public-record warning shot fired six months before Connor met him.

The Loans Affair (Nov 1974 – Nov 1975)

The intermediary chain

The Whitlam Government had no direct foreign-banking expertise. Khemlani reached Connor through a six-link chain (Bhojwani → Yu → Cranendonk → Shelley/Anderson/Karidis → Cameron → Connor) every link of which has now been documented:

• Bhojwani: a Hong Kong businessman (his daughter went to school with Peter Game’s daughter in Melbourne — Game later used this connection to find Khemlani — An Eyewitness History of Australia, Gordon 1988, p.510).
• Thomas Ho-lung Yu (Hong Kong): a former Flying Tigers pilot, allegedly assistant comptroller of the CIA airline Civil Air Transport / Air America. Arms-and-commodities dealer. Telexed Cranendonk in Holland; Khemlani was sitting in Cranendonk’s office that day (Freney 1985, citing Cranendonk). Per Khemlani’s own self-aggrandising account on first hearing the Yu telex (Lloyd & Clark, Kerr’s King Hit (Cassell Australia, 1976), pp.141–2; quoted Freney 1985 p.5), Khemlani claimed a “friend” — a former secretary to the Saudi king named “His Excellency Sheikh Sikkar Gassan” — was staying at the Dorchester Hotel in London and would raise US$2 billion. Sheikh Sikkar Gassan is not independently attested in any open source and may be a Khemlani invention.
• Theodor “Theo” Cranendonk (17 May 1931 – 2018): Dutch arms-and-commodities trader, born Rotterdam; lived Breukelen (Utrecht) and later Estepona (Spain). Traded as “Globe Chemicals”. Joint-ventured 1975 with Yu, Gerhard Whiffen (Commerce International Singapore) and the American/Australian pair Brading and Booth on Vietnam-surplus arms to UNITA/FNLA in Angola.
• Tibor Shelley (Adelaide): jeweller/opal dealer with arms-trade interests; founder of Queen Stone Opal (Adelaide); Hungarian-Jewish refugee origin (asserted in secondary literature but not directly corroborated). Director of Opal Exporters Pty Ltd, signatory to an 8 Nov 1974 agreement with Khemlani / Globe Control Finance and Trade Co. (and Chinese partners) to arrange the cash loans.
• Tim Anderson: Adelaide commercial solicitor; Gerry Karidis’s lawyer. (Not the Tim Anderson convicted/acquitted of the Hilton bombing — that man was 21 in 1974.)
• Gerasimos “Gerry” Karidis AM (b. 1937, Lefkada, Greece — still living as of November 2025): Adelaide builder/property developer; emigrated December 1955; established Karidis Corporation Limited 1975; appointed AM in the Queen’s Birthday honours (Commonwealth Gazette S141, 11 June 1990) for “service to the building and construction industry and … to the Greek community”; memoir Building, Always Building (with Brian Abbey, Wakefield Press 2012). His first name is Gerasimos — so given in both the AM gazettal (“Gerasimos Karidis, 63 Light Square, Adelaide”) and US Embassy cable 1975CANBER04950; an earlier draft of this file wrongly had “Konstantinos”. Met Clyde Cameron at an Adelaide party in October 1974 (Carney 2012 p.67), with Don Dunstan present. The Adelaide South Australian Greek-community connection is documented in Neos Kosmos, 25 Nov 2025.
• Clyde Cameron (Minister for Labour and Immigration; later Science and Consumer Affairs): brought Karidis to Connor. He is the source of the post-mortem judgment: “With the benefit of hindsight, I believe Khemlani was a conman.”
• Rex Connor (Reginald Francis Xavier “Rex” Connor, 1907–1977): Minister for Minerals and Energy 1972–75. “Big Australian”, former articled clerk from Wollongong, “the credulous ex-articled clerk” (Book of Leaks p.21). Code-named “Rockphosphate” in the Yu→Khemlani telex traffic of December 1974.

Khemlani’s Australian trip and the Loan authority

• 11 November 1974 — Khemlani arrived Sydney from London with Cranendonk and Anderson; met at Sydney Airport by Karidis; flown straight to Canberra; checked into Lakeside Hotel, then Parliament House. Karidis introduced him to Cameron, then Connor. Almost immediately a preliminary meeting with Jim Cairns (Deputy PM / Treasurer), Sir Lenox Hewitt (Permanent Head, Dept. of Minerals and Energy), Cameron, Karidis, Anderson and Shelley.
• 11 November 1974 — Long telex from Charles Drover (often mis-spelt “Driver” in later secondary literature) of London law firm Coward Chance — an old friend of Sir Lenox Hewitt. Telex reported a thorough investigation of Khemlani and Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) and gave a positive reference. (Drover later met Khemlani in London on 5 December 1974 to inspect a UBS-account-numbers document; see AIM Network “Anglo-American Ambush” Part 2.) A separate verbal blessing came from Johnson Matthey Bankers Ltd describing the wider Dalamal group as “a wealthy and respectable Indian international group … with extensive and important connections in the Middle East.” JMB themselves collapsed in 1984 in a fraud crisis that needed a Bank of England rescue. Coward Chance, founded 1791, merged into Clifford Chance in 1987.
• 3 December 1974 — Khemlani telex to Connor (cited in Kelly’s Dismissal): scheduled deal progress.
• 12 December 1974 — Telex from Thomas Yu in Hong Kong to Khemlani in London — the “AG Tall Man” message: “AG (Australian Government) Tall Man does not want to have anything to do with the Reserve Bank in London on the AG Project as that will attract publicity. … He gave us express instructions to request you and your bank to stay away from the Reserve Bank in London. … Tall Man told us that the most vital minister in this project is the Rockphosphate (apparently Connor). … Furthermore the AG Tall Man instructs us to use only codes for the names of all the ministers involved in this project.” (Book of Leaks p.72.) The “Tall Man” has never been identified in the secondary literature.
• 13 December 1974 — Executive Council authority for Connor to raise US$4 billion for “temporary purposes” (bypassing the Loan Council). Governor-General Kerr was not present; he signed the minute the next day.
• 7 January 1975 — First EXCO authority lapsed/revoked.
• 28 January 1975 — Second EXCO authority for US$2 billion.
• Mid-February 1975 (dating uncertain) — Book of Leaks says a “new EXCO had gone ahead the day before” Treasury Deputy Secretary Sir John Phillips’s written protest arrived, and this file previously dated that decision to 14 February 1975. Note, however, that NAA Fact Sheet 239 records only two loan authorities (13 Dec 1974 and 28 Jan 1975), so the “new EXCO” may equally be the 28 January minute; the Executive Council minute books (NAA A1573, 1975/8) would settle it.
• 26 February 1975, 4.10 pm — “Wheeler Tapes”: Phillips to Wheeler: “I have got one nasty thought on this … he forges promissory notes. He has got Connor’s signature. He forges a promissory note and takes the money and hopes nobody will ask any questions for 20 years.”
• March 1975 — Cairns signed (apparently inattentively) a letter agreeing to a 2.5% commission to George Harris (Carlton Football Club President; b. 1922 St Kilda, d. 26 Nov 2007 Heidelberg, VIC; WWII Changi POW). The Harris letter was an entirely separate loan attempt running in parallel.
• 2 April 1975 — Connor (in Tokyo) became entangled with the Overseas Development Bank (linked to Bernie Cornfeld and Robert Vesco). Khemlani spent night after night by the telex without result.
• 20 May 1975 — Whitlam revoked Connor’s loan-raising authority.
• 23 May 1975 — Khemlani telexed Connor saying the loan was “within reach”; Connor replied positively (the fatal move) — his reply telex opening “Attention Mr T. H. Khemlani: Response your telex of 0310…” (Sexton 1979 p.334). Same day, The Age, p. 1: “I gave loan letter: Connor – Pakistani money broker intermediary in Australian loan deal.” With photo of Khemlani’s “real” London office — in the basement of a Bulgarian tavern — and headlines “Money men say it’s funny money”, “Mystery man flew off to Beirut, says office”.
• 6 June 1975 — US Embassy Canberra cable 1975CANBER03700 reports Cairns removed from Treasury after the George Harris correspondence on “Arab petro-dollar loans” surfaced.
• 2 July 1975 — Embassy cable 1975CANBER04313: “Cairns offered 2.5% brokerage on a $2bn loan, contradicting his parliamentary denial. Crisis worst since 1972.”
• 3 July 1975 — Embassy cable 1975CANBER04333: “Whitlam sacks Cairns (Mar 7 letter vs Jun 4 denial). Embassy calls government loan-handling ‘bewildering’ and ‘inept’.”
• 7 July 1975 — Embassy cable 1975CANBER04389: “Whitlam recalls House for special 9 Jul session to table the Connor→Tirath Hassaram Khemlani letter authorising US$4 bn loan.” Describes him as a “London-based Pakistani financier born in Singapore.”
• 9 July 1975 — Special HoR sitting on the Loans Affair. Documents tabled identify Khemlani as: “Mr Tirath Hassaram Khemlani, Manager, Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) Ltd, 8 West Eaton Place”. Connor first lists the intended uses of the $4 bn (gas pipeline, petrochems, uranium, rail electrification, harbours).
• 24 July 1975 — Embassy cable 1975CANBER04950: “Senate inquiry effectively ends after Gerasimos Karidis (‘Adelaide financial contact’) proves ‘polite but uninformative’.”
• 6 October 1975 — Melbourne Herald publishes Peter Game’s “KHEMLANI TELLS” front-page scoop — extracted from 19 hours of secret tape-recorded interviews in London. Game had been tipped off by a Hong Kong businessman, Mr Bhojwani, whose daughter went to school with Game’s. Game won a Walkley Award for the story (announced October 1976).
• 8 October 1975 — Connor on ABC’s PM programme denies communicating with Khemlani; compares Game’s coverage to “the ‘big lie’ technique of Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels.”
• on/about 13 October 1975 (first October visit) — Khemlani arrived in Sydney with his documents; Opposition staff spent the period “poring over Khemlani’s suitcases in Sydney on or about 13 October 1975” (Sen. Walsh, Senate, 7 Nov 1979). A statutory declaration and the telexes proving Connor’s post-revocation contact were delivered to The Melbourne Herald (Peter Game) and — on the night of 13 October, by solicitors Messrs Con and Corr — to Whitlam himself; the Herald published them on 13–14 October (Whitlam, HoR, 14 Oct 1975: “the telexes which Messrs Con and Corr delivered to me yesterday and which were published in yesterday’s and today’s Melbourne Herald”).
• 27–30 October 1975 (second visit) — Khemlani re-entered Australia on 27 October and went on to Canberra with eight suitcases of documents (later eight briefcases in some Hansard usage). Immigration Minister Senator James McClelland told the Senate on 28 October that “attorneys in New York” had telephoned on the Friday night to ask whether a visa would be available, and that he had directed “the usual transit facilities, that is, he could stay here for another 72 hours” — adding, of the Opposition, “I have been awaiting eagerly to get a question on the Opposition’s client.” Khemlani was met at the airport by members of Deputy Opposition Leader Phillip Lynch’s staff who “spirited him to a local hotel” (US Embassy cable 1975CANBER07323, 31 Oct 1975 — “the whole episode, which in some respects resembled a badly scripted Marx Brothers film, made the Opposition look foolish”). On 29 October James McClelland referred back to “the orchestration of the previous arrival of Mr Khemlani”, confirming the two separate October visits (an earlier draft of this file conflated them). A further, more detailed statutory declaration followed on 3 November 1975 (NAA A1209, 1975/2400) — the one Senator Wheeldon dissected on 5 November.
• 14 October 1975 — Connor sacked. US Embassy cable 1975CANBER06876: “Connor forced to resign after Khemlani’s telexes show contact continued past 20 May.” In Question Time the same day (Hansard p.2035), Ian Sinclair asked the Prime Minister “whether he has ever met Mr Khemlani. If so, where and when?” — Whitlam: “Mr Speaker, no.” (This exchange is the factual basis of the “I have never met Mr Khemlani” line an earlier draft of this file quoted as if verbatim.) Whitlam also explained the sacking: “I advised the Governor-General to accept the Minister’s resignation because I do not believe in the accuracy of the assurance which the Minister gave me that all communications of substance between him and Mr Khemlani were tabled by him on 9 July last.”
• 15 October 1975 — Whitlam rules out a royal commission (“The facts which led to yesterday’s event were not disputed by anybody”) and notes that Khemlani “may consider that he has some cause of action against the Australian Government. The courts are there for him to take such action.”
• 28 October 1975 — Whitlam to Hansard: “there were many contacts with increasing frequency between [Connor] and Mr Khemlani — more contacts between him and Mr Khemlani than between my colleagues.”
• 28–30 October 1975 — Multiple Senate exchanges on whether to summon Khemlani to the Bar of the Senate. Opposition explicitly refused to call him, preferring to bank the Statutory Declaration and the telexes — on 29 October Senator Douglas McClelland noted that Withers’s holding notice meant “the Opposition does not intend to move that the Senate call Mr Khemlani to the bar of the Senate”. The “Opposition’s client” jibe was Senator James McClelland’s (28 Oct; an earlier draft of this file misattributed it to “Don McClelland”); Senator Wriedt had already told the Senate on 16 October: “As far as the Government is concerned, Mr Khemlani does not exist any more.”
• 4 November 1975 — Major Senate debate after Lynch produces eight briefcases of Khemlani documents in Sydney; details under Hansard discussion at https://historichansard.net/senate/1975/19751104_senate_29_s66/
• 5 November 1975 — Senate Hansard pp. 1741-62 — Sen. Wheeldon: detailed examination of Khemlani’s photocopied passport and statutory declaration on Connor meetings; details of the midnight office procedure.
• 11 November 1975 — Whitlam dismissed by Sir John Kerr. Fraser, in the day’s debate on Khemlani: “his agent, his intermediary, the person who was good enough to pursue $4,000m for this Government for 12 months — Mr Khemlani’s charges.” The “unholy relic” line was Deputy PM Frank Crean’s, not Whitlam’s: “the issue is not about the unholy relic, Khemlani” (Historic Hansard, 11 Nov 1975; an earlier draft of this file misattributed it).
• 25 November 1975 — Telegram from Khemlani’s Sydney solicitor John Francis Licardy (sometimes mis-spelt “Lacardy”): “DLS 25,000 Aust offered for story contact me urgently for details.” Licardy was struck off the roll of solicitors in November 1976 and declared bankrupt soon after; in his own bankruptcy hearings (Registrar of Bankruptcy, Sydney, 439/76) he claimed Khemlani owed him $20,000 for services rendered in late 1975, and “continued to transfer large sums of money from clients’ accounts to his own trust account” even after action was under way to have him struck off (Freney 1985 pp.10–11). Freney adds that Licardy was at the time an associate of — and co-shareholder in St Antons Pty Ltd with — John Arthur Boyden, later a central figure in the Costigan Royal Commission’s Hamidan tax-fraud investigation and a Transia Corporation man; Freney’s pointed question: “Who recommended he use Licardy?” Lionel Bowen alleged in the House on 6 May 1976 that after Khemlani “skipped the country” Licardy’s bills were “finally paid … again by Mr Lynch”, i.e. by the Liberal Party (Hansard, 6 May 1976).
• Also present in Australia October–November 1975 with Khemlani: Alan James Crawford, Australian living in London, described as Khemlani’s “business associate”. Crawford had previously been involved with the offshore British pirate radio Radio Caroline and (per Senator John Wheeldon, Senate, 4 November 1975) had been “prominent in Scientology circles” and at one point “had been able to sell tickets to gullible Americans and others willing to pay hard cash for seats on the first commercial flight — to the moon.”

Commission shares (per Sexton 1979 p.334)

Total commissions implied by the Khemlani / Karidis paperwork were of the order of US$24 million on a US$4 billion loan (~0.6%, well below the publicly-claimed 2.5%): - Karidis: US$7 million - Cranendonk: US$7 million - Shelley: US$3 million - Khemlani: balance (perhaps US$7 million — the figure does not survive the secondary literature).

Post-dismissal, second loans-affair re-emergence and Nugan Hand period (1976 – 1980)

• 14 February 1976 — Canberra Times p. 5: “London writ against Khemlani” — fraud-and-conspiracy writ in the Chancery Division of the High Court of London (Friday 13 Feb 1976), Miss Susan Garth trading as International Trading Centre, naming Khemlani first defendant, Mr Gobind Dalamal second, Dalamal and Sons (Commodities) Ltd third — over deals arranged in 1974.
• 26 February 1976 — US Embassy Canberra cable 1976CANBER01477, CONFIDENTIAL — first US report of the Iraqi Breakfast affair (see “Iraqi Breakfast” section below).
• 27 February 1976 — US Embassy Canberra cable 1976CANBER01553, SECRET — Whitlam (now opposition leader) tells US Ambassador Hargrove privately that he expects to be ousted “within a week”; confirms his awareness of the Combe/Hartley Iraqi-funding attempt; calls Bob Hawke “a pro-Israeli fanatic.” First direct documentary evidence of Whitlam’s personal knowledge of the Iraqi-money channel two months after the Fischer breakfast.
• 6 May 1976 — HoR: Lionel Bowen, without naming him, pointed at Sir William Archer Gunn (1914–2003; former Australian Wool Board chairman) as a funder of Khemlani: “Who financed Khemlani? … Did they not come from a knight in Queensland? … I invite the Government to have a royal commission into what money was paid to Khemlani; from what source in Queensland that money came; and whether it came from a source very close to the Country Party” — and further alleged that “if they analyse Khemlani’s bank account they will see that the funds have come from people closely affiliated with honourable members opposite”, that Khemlani’s movements “were financed from the slush funds by the present Treasurer, Mr Lynch”, and that Andrew Hay’s European hotel bills and Licardy’s bills were paid the same way (Historic Hansard, 6 May 1976 — confirming Freney’s “H of R May 6, 1976” citation, which an earlier draft of this file could not verify because Bowen never says “Gunn”; Freney supplied the identification). Note: Gunn himself had been actively engaged in a parallel April 1975 attempt to raise US$3.7 billion in petrodollar loans for Australia, bypassing Treasury — see Wikipedia: William Archer Gunn. The US Embassy reported the exchange the next day (cable 1976CANBER03378, which also carries Whitlam’s allegation that Fraser had engaged US merchant banker Richard B. Todd).
• 18 June 1976 — The Age p. 6: “Khemlani on move again in dollar chase” — Ben Hills, roving correspondent.
• 21 October 1976 — Canberra Times: Walkley Awards roundup — Peter Game (Melbourne Herald) wins for “Khemlani Tells”.
• 1976 (Oakes, Crash Through or Crash, p.135) — alleges that two multinational and two Australian-owned companies had contributed US$250,000 between them to pay Khemlani to “co-operate with the Liberals” (i.e. release the incriminating documents). The Hawaiian Honolulu hotel-room telex (next item) was the documentary trail behind this.
• November 1975 / 1976 — Per Toohey, National Times, 16–22 August 1981 (quoted in Freney 1985): “Early in November 1975, Whitlam received a copy of a message found in a Hawaii hotel room. The handwritten message, was allegedly the draft for a telex message sent to Fraser in October 1975. It detailed the ”chaos” which Khemlani was being ”funded” to cause … instructions that it should be coded before transmission, by calling a particular Honolulu phone number. The National Times has called the number. It was the Hawaiian headquarters of the CIA in 1975.”
• 1976 — Nugan Hand Bank incorporated in Cayman Islands.
• 15 June 1977 — Earliest documentary date placing Khemlani inside the Duvalier regime: his Haitian passport issued (per the bail-surrender list in 1981, Book of Leaks p.73).
• 25 February 1977 — Khemlani’s Sierra Leone passport issued (per same source).
• 5 April 1977 — Citizens National Bank of Chicago reports to the FBI that US$2 million in blank money orders are missing from a shipment from New York — the underlying theft that will catch Khemlani in 1979–80. (FBI Agent Bolling deposition, quoted Book of Leaks p.73.)
• c. 1977 — The Age / Herald headline: “Khemlani resurfaces — in Hong Kong” (file shows the cutting). Per Freney 1985: from 1977 Khemlani was already “the director of commercial and financial affairs of Onocoro Petrole, a petroleum corporation owned by the government of the Caribbean nation of Haiti” (Freney’s own citation is Toohey, National Times, 16–22 Aug 1981) — i.e. the ONACORA role pre-dates the 1979 State Dept cables by two years and matches the 15 Jun 1977 passport issue.
• 22–30 October 1977 — Stayed at the Gateway Motel, Adelaide. Raised by Senator Steele Hall in a Question without Notice on 8 November 1977 (Historic Hansard): “Is the Leader of the Government in the Senate aware that Mr Khemlani of the loans affair reputedly stayed at the Gateway Motel in Adelaide from 22 to 30 October this year? As Mr Khemlani is reported to have made telephone calls to Canberra, does the Minister believe that there is any possibility that he could be involved in planning the Australian Labor Party’s financial policy prior to the election campaign?” Senator Reg Withers (Leader of Government) replied that Khemlani would “most probably go back to his other old contact” (i.e. Clyde Cameron) and added that the Labor Party would have to go off to “old potato chips and monkey nuts to be able to do any dealings” — a riff on Khemlani’s London nickname “Old Rice and Monkey Nuts”.
• 1 November 1977 — Khemlani’s UK passport issued in Singapore (per same source). Three different countries’ passports in nine months (Feb–Nov 1977), all from places where the issuing-state was either an oil-broker pretext (Haiti, Sierra Leone) or a residence-renewal (UK in Singapore).
• August 1978 — Khemlani met Nugan Hand officials in Singapore and outlined four projects.
• 18 September 1978 — Khemlani’s formal proposal to Nugan Hand.
• 19 September 1978 — Michael Hand (Nugan Hand co-founder, ex-CIA covert operator in SE Asia) wrote to Khemlani at his Odyssey Trading Corporation, Grand Cayman address, endorsing the four projects, including “Project Olives” — Nugan Hand to be recipient of US$5 million/month from “various parts of the world” on behalf of an Italian VIP-protection / anti-terrorist company, with funds notified to Chase Manhattan / its Swiss subsidiary / an “unspecified party” in Rome. Plausible 1978 Italian-firm candidates (untested): Stibam International Transport (Henri Arsan’s Milan firm, later linked by Italian magistrates to Gladio-adjacent laundering); the post-Moro private VIP-bodyguard market (Aldo Moro had been kidnapped 16 March – 9 May 1978).
• December 1978 — Khemlani telexed Nugan Hand officer Graeme Steer: “Your no. one and two are very interesting for the said allocation was given to me by the president, cash payment was to be 4.2 billion.”
• 1978–79 — Khemlani–Nugan Hand telexes about Philippine peso shifts via Singapore and Saudi Arabia, and Indonesian oil deals. Khemlani worried Hand was trying to elevate Nugan Hand from trustee banker to dealmaker, cutting Khemlani out.
• 23 August 1979 — Per Bolling’s later deposition: US$1 million of the stolen Chicago money orders “transported out of the US at Khemlani’s direction.”
• 1979 — Khemlani as “Board Member and Commercial & Financial Manager” of ONACORA, Haiti — rendered in cable 1979PORTA04879 as the “Haitian National Office for the Sale and Refining of Petroleum Products” (the cable gives only this English gloss; the underlying French expansion of the acronym is not spelled out in any open source, and the French form given in an earlier draft of this file was a reconstruction). (Toohey & Wilkinson Book of Leaks p.74 mis-spell the body as “Onocoro Petrole”; Freney 1985 also uses “Onocoro Petrole”; the two State Department cables confirm the ONACORA form.) Authorised by Minister of Mines and Energy Resources Fritz Pierre-Louis to negotiate (but not to sign) OPEC oil deals on behalf of the Government of Haiti.
• 10 October 1979 — State Dept cable to Port-au-Prince (1979STATE265362): “MR KEMLANI (PHONETIC) … Pakistani national … personal representative of President [Jean-Claude] Duvalier in a petroleum marketing scheme” — fielding inquiries from petroleum companies in Texas, Kansas, Oklahoma. The “OPEC largesse” was attributed to “humanitarian assistance and payoff for Haiti’s favourable votes in UN and other fora.”
• 26 October 1979 — Fritz Pierre-Louis personally confirmed Khemlani’s credentials to the US Ambassador in Port-au-Prince (cable 1979PORTA04879, 29 Oct 1979): “KHEMLANI IS AUTHORIZED TO NEGOTIATE SUCH DEAL, BUT IS NOT REPEAT NOT AUTHORIZED TO SIGN ON BEHALF OF GOH; HE MUST REFER DEAL TO BOARD OF DIRECTORS FOR APPROVAL.” Pierre-Louis added that he “did not know [the] country which might supply petroleum for resale, indicating this was being handled by Khemlani”. Haiti had previously refused OPEC dealings because OPEC required Haiti to sever ties with Israel — a condition Haiti said it could not meet.
• 28 October 1979 — Kuwait cable 1979KUWAIT04943: “THE GOVERNMENT OF KUWAIT DOES NOT SELL CRUDE OIL ON CONCESSIONAL TERMS TO ANYONE … Kuwaitis may have spoken with KEMLANI as they have with other visitors of varying degrees of reputableness during the past few months.”
• 20 January 1980 — FBI Special Agent Charles Bolling swore out a warrant for Khemlani’s arrest, with a supporting deposition. Freney (p.10) and Book of Leaks (p.73) agree on 20 January 1980 (an earlier draft of this file claimed Book of Leaks said 26 January; the page photo shows 20 January). Bolling stated Khemlani had admitted in a tape-recorded conversation to having received the money orders “from members of the Mafia” (Book of Leaks p.73; Freney p.10).
• 27 January 1980 — Frank Nugan found dead.
• 1980 — Collapse of Nugan Hand Bank. Bank’s key American officers carry out “selective destruction” of records (Marian Wilkinson). Khemlani “walked out of [Charles] Murphy’s New Jersey home” in 1979 (per Book of Leaks p.70) / “over five years ago” (per National Times 15 Nov 1985 i.e. c.1980) leaving behind suitcases full of documents.
• 1980 – early 1981 — Khemlani arrested by the FBI over the Citizens National Bank money-orders shipment. The sources conflict on the timing: Book of Leaks p.73 has him “re-emerg[ing] in a New York court” early in 1980 (i.e. soon after the 20 Jan warrant), while Book of Leaks p.70 and the ADB say the FBI arrest was “early in 1981” (which is when the US authorities told ASIO). The 5 Feb 1981 bail release and 22 June 1981 sentencing are firm; only the EDNY docket would pin the arrest date.

US prosecution (1980 – 1981)

The clearest single account of the whole criminal proceeding is Book of Leaks (1987) pp.72–74 + Freney 1985 pp.10–11. Reconstructed:

• 5 February 1981 — Released on bail of US$250,000: $75,000 cash from Khemlani himself plus a further US$500,000 surety from four US citizens. Three (from New Jersey and Pittsburgh) refused to comment to Toohey. Two of the four, per Freney citing Toohey, “are regarded by the FBI as being agents for the New Jersey mafia family.” The fourth — M.L. Wooldridge of Richmond, Virginia — told Toohey/Wilkinson he had only met Khemlani once but had staked his US$500,000 of assets “because I liked him” (Book of Leaks p.73). Wooldridge is not findable in any open public record; the FBI/EDNY case file would identify all four.
• Grand jury indictment, US District Court for the Eastern District of New York (Brooklyn) — “possession and transportation of bonds known to be stolen.” The indictment named the defendant variously as Tirath Hassaram Khemlani, Peter Khemlani, and Tirathdas Hassaram. Date problem: Book of Leaks p.73 prints “indicted by a Grand Jury on February 29, 1980” yet narrates the indictment as following the 5 Feb 1981 bail release (“was then indicted”); an earlier draft of this file gave “25 February 1981” — a date traceable to no source we hold. Either the grand jury indicted in Feb 1980 ahead of the arrest, or Book of Leaks’ year is a misprint for 1981; the EDNY docket (NARA RG 21) would resolve it.
• 22 June 1981 — Conviction and sentencing. On the prosecution’s motion the two major indictments were dropped, bail “exonerated”, and travel limits “extended to the world.” Final plea, per Khemlani’s New York lawyer Kenneth Kaplan (former AUSA EDNY 1972–77; Deputy Chief, Criminal Division; Chief, Official Corruption Unit; private criminal-defence practice from 1977): “misprision of a felony” — the common-law offence of failing to report a known crime, itself implicitly conceding the Mafia knowledge. Sentence: US$500 fine + three-year suspended sentence (Toohey & Wilkinson, Book of Leaks p.74; ADB shorthands this as “convicted but immediately pardoned”). Prospective defence witnesses (not in fact called) included Tony Baer (Hong Kong), Mori Moto (Tokyo), Teo Cheukang (Bangkok), John Eramanis (Singapore), A.T. DeLoos (Amsterdam), and Leo Rothsee (Miami) — a near-complete diagram of Khemlani’s late-1970s Asian/European/American business network (Book of Leaks p.74). None are independently traceable on the open web (the rarest surname, “Eramanis”, has 93% of bearers in Oceania per Forebears.io).
• The US authorities informed ASIO of the arrest “early in 1981” (oddly, not the Foreign Affairs Department) — Book of Leaks p.70.
• 19 August 1981 — Tribune (Sydney) p.7: “Khemlani admits Mafia link” (Trove) — Toohey, by-line from The National Times, 16–22 Aug 1981. Toohey raises three questions: (i) whether Khemlani had Mafia contact in 1975; (ii) whether he received US$400,000 from a private US company “to reveal the information that precipitated the ‘supply crisis’ in 1975” (sourced to “a well-placed National Country Party source”) (Book of Leaks p.74); (iii) what intelligence connection that US company might have had. The Toohey series also broke the Hawaiian Honolulu CIA telephone number story (above).

Final decade (1981 – 1991)

• c. 1980–81 — Khemlani “had a falling out with ‘Baby Doc’s’ regime and was relieved of the position” of ONACORA director-of-commercial-and-financial-affairs (Book of Leaks p.74; Freney 1985 pp.10–11).
• 17 November / 10 December 1982 — London Gazette notices: “K B & Co (Manchester) Limited” winding-up, “T. Khemlani, Director”, 2 Mount Street, Manchester M2 5NG (Gazette Issue 49184, p.15800, 2 Dec 1982, follow-ups Issues 50062 (13 Mar 1985) and 52730 (29 Nov 1991) for the s.106 Companies Act 1985 completion). The cognate but legally distinct K B (Import & Export) Limited (Companies House 01490164, incorporated 10 April 1980, registered at 22 York Buildings, John Adam Street, London WC2N 6JU) was — and remains — a Khemlani-family vehicle with Tirthdas Khemchand, Shoba, Sunder, Ramesh and Mohan Khemlani as directors. Tirath Hassaram himself was not a K B (Import & Export) director.
• National Times November 1982 — Wheeler’s tape-recorded protest phone calls of 20 December 1974 to ministers and officials opposing the Khemlani deal are published, with the famous Wheeler line to Whitlam: “Prime Minister, you will listen to me. I am drawing to your attention facts, your ignorance of which, will bring you down.” (Source: John Farquharson, Wheeler obituary, Canberra Times 7 Aug 1994 — Trove 118260996.)
• 24 March 1983 — Sydney Morning Herald (quoted in Freney 1985 pp.10–11): “Khemlani resurfaces in Hong Kong” — claims to represent Arab oil interests prepared to put up millions to save the failed Hong Kong property developer EDA Investments Ltd (incorporated 15 Dec 1972, owned by the Chung family — George Tan of Carrian had begun as EDA’s civil-engineering manager in 1972; the larger 1982–83 Carrian/Bank Bumiputra Malaysia collapse was contemporaneous). Peter Dodds, managing director of Barclays Asia, said Khemlani had produced documents showing that he had been “involved in raising substantial sums of money for (among others) the Australian government, the Republic of Angola and Sierra Leone”. One of the letters produced by Khemlani was signed by the late Rex Connor. Khemlani handed around a visiting card describing himself as “roving ambassador and special assistant to the President of Haiti (retired)”. Presented himself as a director of Macwell International Investments of Hong Kong and claimed to represent a “bank” with headquarters in the London dormitory suburb of Stockwell. “Hardly the place where merchant bankers of the world put their offices,” said a Hong Kong banker. “It was something from Alice in Wonderland.” “Khemlani was laughed out of Hong Kong …”
• June 1985 — Stewart Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Activities of the Nugan Hand Group Final Report (Justice Donald Stewart, Parliamentary Paper 369/1985; NLA cat. 2096210; Vol. 2 digitised at nla.gov.au/nla.obj-1458726976) — does not name Khemlani. The Commission found Nugan Hand committed 370+ exchange-control breaches (>$16m, the “Yorkville Contra” scheme) but dismissed CIA/drugs/arms allegations. Notably, “the 205 paragraphs which identify [persons it accused of crimes] have been deleted from the published report” — the most plausible site for any Khemlani material.
• 28 November 1985 — Canberra Times: “Royal commission report Nugan Hand ‘not into drugs, arms’” (Trove 127541113) — Khemlani not named.
• 15–21 November 1985 — The National Times cover-story this user’s file is from, p. 20 & 22: “Khemlani link with Nugan Hand” by Marian Wilkinson, Washington — Khemlani’s papers and suitcases left with Charles Murphy of New Jersey form the basis. First public disclosure of the Nugan Hand link. Brings out Project Olives, Odyssey Trading and the Steer/Hand telexes.
• 29 December 1986 — Edinburgh Gazette notice: William Hardie (Chartered Accountant) having resigned, Gerald Ian Rankin sought as Official Liquidator of T. Hassaram & Company Limited (in Liquidation), 142 St Vincent Street, Glasgow.
• 1987 — Singapore corporate register entry for Labrador Drilling & Engineering (Singapore) Pte Ltd (petroleum & mining consultant services; marine engineering), 116 Middle Road #18-01, ICB Enterprise House: directors include “Shanti d/o Tirathdas Hassaram” (his daughter), Peter Michael Dwyer, Wayne Alfred Needoba — the Singapore residual of his network.
• Last years — lived in a house in Paisley, near Glasgow, with wife Sarah. Business cards: “roving ambassador and special assistant to the President of Haiti (retired)” (per The Age obituary, 13 Sep 1991, quoting Peter Game).

Death and aftermath (1991 –)

• 19 May 1991 — Died in Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland, of chronic heart disease, aged 70 (Paisley district, Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages).
• c. 19 June 1991 — Sarah Ann Hassaram (née Lambe) died, c. one month later, of a circulatory ailment.
• 13 September 1991 — The Age and Canberra Times obituaries (Canberra Times via Trove 122383735). Notification reached Australia via Glasgow solicitor → Peter Game (b. 1927; Herald-Sun; 1976 Walkley winner for the Khemlani story; Melbourne Press Club Lifetime Achievement/Quill Award 2000; Australian Media Hall of Fame inductee; no death notice traced in public sources as of July 2026 — an earlier draft of this file said “died after 2008”, which was unsupported) → daughter Shanti in South Australia, who only learned of her father’s death that day. Quotes:
  • Jim Cairns: “He was a stranger to me. I know nothing, because I never knew him.”
  • Clyde Cameron: “With the benefit of hindsight, I believe Khemlani was a conman. He told [Mr Connor] he could do things that he couldn’t. It was a marvellous scheme. It went wrong because Khemlani was the wrong man.”
• 20 September 1991 — Texas Observer obituary article (Vol. 83 Iss. 18) p. 27 — frames Khemlani as part of CIA Pine Gap story.
• 2021 — Wayne Reynolds’s entry on Khemlani published in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 19 (ANU Press, 2021); the text is also carried on Obituaries Australia. (An earlier draft of this file dated the entry 2014.)
• 7 November 2020 — Michael Hand, Nugan Hand Bank co-founder, dies in Idaho Falls, Idaho under the name “Michael Jon Fuller”, having fled Australia in June 1980 on a forged passport. He was located there in November 2015 by Australia’s 60 Minutes, working from Peter Butt’s book Merchants of Menace: The True Story of the Nugan Hand Bank Scandal (2015) (Wikipedia; ProPublica).
• November 2025 — Gerry Karidis still alive and styled Chairman of Karidis Corporation; Neos Kosmos feature 25 Nov 2025.

Direct answers to the Wikipedia talk-page questions

Q1 — Pre- and post-Loans story. Pre-1974 he was a Sindhi-diaspora textile importer, briefly with K. Chellaram (London), then a serial failed-company director in Glasgow (Castle Manufacturing 1956–66; T. Hassaram & Co into liquidation 1964–86; personal Scottish bankruptcy 1964 still undischarged in 1975 per The Australian 17 Oct 1975), Manchester (Khemlani & Co Ltd wound up 1968) and London (74–76 Old Compton Street; bankrupt 1971), with a 1959/64 fire-fraud witness role in Glasgow. From around 1973–74 manager of Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) Ltd, London — the £100-capital shell with a confusingly similar name to the genuine Sindhi family firm. Post-1975 he resurfaced in Hong Kong (~1976/77), Adelaide (Oct 1977), Singapore (Nov 1977 UK-passport renewal), the Cayman Islands as Odyssey Trading Corporation (1978–80) running large alleged-money-laundering proposals through Nugan Hand, then Haiti (from 1977, on the evidence of the passport) as ONACORA’s commercial-financial manager / “ambassador” for Duvalier, then New York jail and FBI cooperation (1980–81). Reappeared in Hong Kong March 1983 trying to broker an Arab rescue for EDA via Macwell International — “laughed out of Hong Kong”. Retired to Paisley with Sarah and died there 19 May 1991. London Gazette records suggest he remained a UK director (K B & Co (Manchester) Ltd) into 1982.

Q2 — Nugan Hand and BCCI. Nugan Hand is documented in detail by Marian Wilkinson’s 15 Nov 1985 National Times article (from documents held by Charles Murphy in New Jersey): client of Nugan Hand from at least August 1978; Odyssey Trading Corporation, Grand Cayman; Sept 1978 four-project proposal endorsed by Michael Hand; “Project Olives”; telexes to Graeme Steer. Stewart Royal Commission (June 1985) failed to follow this up — the National Times explicitly says Khemlani’s link “has never before been disclosed” because of “selective destruction” of the bank’s records. No open-source documentary link between Khemlani and BCCI has surfaced. The BCCI claim sometimes made in popular accounts is plausible (BCCI’s Pakistani Sindh roots overlap; Agha Hasan Abedi was building BCCI’s London base 1972–77 just as Khemlani was at 74–76 Old Compton Street) but it is inferential, not documentary, in the sources I’ve examined.

Q3 — Moscow Narodny Bank. Not named in any of the 87-page “Khemlani documents” or in Marian Wilkinson’s Nugan Hand material. The named intermediaries in the loans documents are UBS (Union Bank of Switzerland — denied any record) and Johnson Matthey Bankers Ltd (the reference letter). Treasury’s frantic February–May 1975 verification trail went to UBS and Coward Chance; Moscow Narodny does not feature.

Q4 — Why arrested and then released in 1980–81? He was caught moving US$1m–$2m of stolen money orders (the loot from a 5 April 1977 theft from the Chicago Citizens National Bank) out of the US into Singapore. After his FBI arrest he turned informer: “agreed to be ‘wired up’ by police in a sting operation to track down the men behind the theft”, and in exchange (i) bail of US$250,000 was met with $500,000 surety from four US citizens (two of whom the FBI itself regarded as agents of the New Jersey Mafia family — per Freney 1985), (ii) on prosecution motion the two major indictments were dropped, bail was “exonerated”, travel limits were “extended to the world”, (iii) he pleaded to misprision of a felony (Kenneth Kaplan, attorney), and (iv) he received a US$500 fine + 3-year suspended sentence in a Brooklyn court on 22 June 1981. ADB shorthand is “convicted but immediately pardoned”; that is misleading — the technical disposition was a plea-bargained guilty plea on a lesser offence, not a pardon. The primary source is Brian Toohey’s reporting in the National Times, 16–22 August 1981, reprinted in Tribune Sydney 19 Aug 1981 p.7.

Q5 — Ghana, Sierra Leone, Haiti. Haiti is well documented: ONACORA director / “Special Assistant to President Duvalier” / “roving ambassador (retired)”; brokered (unsuccessfully) concessional Kuwaiti/Iraqi/Libyan crude for refinement-and-resale-to-US-petroleum-companies in 1979 (State Dept cables 1979PORTA04879 / 1979STATE265362 / 1979KUWAIT04943; Rooted in Secrecy (1982), p.40). The Haitian role dates from at least mid-1977 (passport issued 15 June 1977; ONACORA position per Freney 1985). Sierra Leone is documented circumstantially: passport issued 25 February 1977; Khemlani’s own 1983 Hong Kong sales pitch listed “the Republic of Angola and Sierra Leone” as governments he had raised “substantial sums of money” for (SMH 24 March 1983). Ghana is referenced in Wilkinson 1985 — “the conman used the same modus operandi on companies and other governments around the world, including Ghana, Sierra Leone and Haiti” — but the specific transactions and how he obtained that passport are not detailed in any open source I could find. The pattern is the standard Duvalier-era / 1970s small-state “honorary consul / diplomatic passport for sale” practice on the back of his ONACORA-style oil-broker pretext.

Q6 — Hong Kong, Singapore, Pakistan, UK, US. - Pakistan — birthplace (Sindh) only; no documented adult activity. - UK — Glasgow / Paisley 1950–c.1969 (37 Stonefield Drive, Paisley; multiple insolvent companies 1964–86); Manchester (Khemlani & Co Ltd) until 1968; London (74–76 Old Compton Street W.1 and 50 Popes Lane W.5) 1969–74, then 8 West Eaton Place SW1 as Dalamal’s commodities-division front 1974–75 (plus the disputed “basement of a Bulgarian tavern” walk-up office); Manchester again (K B & Co Ltd, 1982); Paisley retirement → death 19 May 1991. - Singapore — corporate base for Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) deal-making; the Thomas Simson & Co Ltd warning was published in Singapore 24 May 1974; UK passport renewed in Singapore 1 Nov 1977; Nugan Hand meetings August 1978; daughter Shanti director of Labrador Drilling & Engineering (Singapore) Pte Ltd 1987. - Hong Kong — intermediary network (Thomas Yu was the Hong Kong end of the introduction to Connor); resurfaced there 1977 (“Khemlani resurfaces — in Hong Kong” headline); 1983 EDA / Macwell International / Barclays Asia episode. - US — New Jersey (Charles Murphy’s home, 1979–80; the suitcases of documents); New York / Brooklyn arrest, trial, sentencing 1980–81; Chicago money orders.

Q7 — Johnson Matthey “positive reference” and Coward Chance checks. Two separate things, neither involving a Khemlani-specific independent check: - Coward Chance / Charles Drover (frequently mis-spelt “Driver” in later secondary literature) was the senior London solicitor — and personal friend of Sir Lenox Hewitt — who sent the long telex of 11 November 1974 reporting an “apparently thorough investigation” of Dalamal & Sons, confirming that Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) was “indeed part of the larger Dalamal group of companies, … a wealthy and respectable international group with world-wide connections … with extensive and important connections in the Middle East.” Drover met Khemlani again in London on 5 December 1974 to inspect a UBS-account-numbers document. What he did not do was establish that Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) was the £100-capital shell, separately incorporated, that Khemlani had been managing for only six months. - Johnson Matthey Bankers Ltd — issued a banker’s reference letter on the Dalamal group (not on Khemlani personally) using the same conflation. JMB themselves collapsed in 1984 in a fraud crisis that needed a Bank of England rescue — there was no later “second look” at this reference. - The 1971 English bankruptcy and the 1964 Scottish bankruptcy were both discoverable in public records. Treasury (Wheeler/Phillips) established the fraud in days, by phone, in February 1975 (“It took Treasury just a few phone calls to establish that Khemlani was, almost certainly, a fraud” — Hocking). So the answer to “did he just use a different name and nobody noticed?” is: yes — UK records were under “Hassaram” / “Tirathdas Hassaram”; he was being checked out as “Khemlani”; and Johnson Matthey / Coward Chance were being asked about the Dalamal firm not about him. The very thing the May 1974 Thomas Simson notice tried to warn about — three names, no authority — went unread by the Australian Government six months later. - Independent third party: (Sir) James Wolfensohn, then London-based investment banker (later President of the World Bank), was asked by Whitlam himself for advice and concluded Khemlani “sounded like a con man” (per ADB). In Wolfensohn’s own memoir A Global Life: My Journey Among Rich and Poor, from Sydney to Wall Street to the World Bank (PublicAffairs, 2010) p.168: “I spent a couple of days trying to talk Whitlam out of working with him and departed feeling very pleased with myself, believing I had succeeded.”

Q8 — Other names. See the table at the top. Material additions in this version: the 1981 EDNY grand-jury indictment formally listed three aliases (Tirath Hassaram Khemlani / Peter Khemlani / Tirathdas Hassaram); Wheeler’s working nicknames were “funny-money man” and “carpet-bagger”; the FBI FOIA-log subject is “KHEMLANI, TIROTH” (an internal misspelling).

Q9 — Where did the money for international travel come from? Genuinely open. The two best contemporary attempts to put a figure on it: - Laurie Oakes, Crash Through or Crash (1976) p.135: US$250,000 from “two multinational and two Australian-owned companies” — paid for Khemlani to “co-operate with the Liberals” (i.e. release the incriminating documents in October 1975). Lionel Bowen in the HoR on 6 May 1976 alleged that Sir William Gunn had partly funded Khemlani. - Brian Toohey, National Times 16–22 August 1981 (quoted by Freney 1985 pp.9–10): “Khemlani had been paid US$400,000 by a private US company to reveal the information that precipitated the ‘supply crisis’ in 1975” — sourced to “a well-placed National Country Party source.” Khemlani’s New York lawyer Kenneth Kaplan refused to make him available for interview. The same Toohey article placed a draft telex sent to Fraser in October 1975 in a Hawaiian hotel room, with coding instructions referring to a Honolulu phone number that “The National Times has called … It was the Hawaiian headquarters of the CIA in 1975.”

Marian Wilkinson (1985) puts the wider question plainly: “Usually the victims were putting up the money themselves for this costly exercise although in the case of Connor it is still unclear who paid for Khemlani’s expensive and drawn out international game. One thing that is certain from Khemlani’s modus operandi, he rarely picked up the tab.” For the 1978–80 period the answer was Nugan Hand fees and his Haiti ONACORA salary; for 1981 onward, presumably FBI / Haitian-government residuals. For 1974–75 itself, the candidates are (a) commission-hopeful intermediaries (Cranendonk / Yu / Shelley / Karidis), (b) the Mercantile Bank and Trust Co of Freeport, Bahamas (a CIA front established by Col. Paul Helliwell — WSJ 17 Feb 1981), (c) one or more rival arms-dealing groups around Commerce International / Edwards-Ohlsson, (d) the un-named US company of Toohey’s 1981 piece — none documented in primary sources.

Adjacent affair — the “Iraqi Breakfast” (Dec 1975 – 1976)

Book of Leaks explicitly cross-references this story to Khemlani’s later New York friends (p.74: “the so-called Iraqi Breakfast affair … becomes even more bizarre”). Worth summarising as it is now indirectly part of Khemlani’s biography. (For a fuller bibliography see Bramston, Quadrant March 2016; Rodney Tiffen, Pearls and Irritations Sept 2025; Suzanne Rutland, AJHS Journal 22(2) 2015; Philip Dorling, Narooma News reprint 2012.)

• Henri (“Henry John”) Fischer — also used the names Ken Wilson and D. Staples (per the 4 April 1995 LSF news brief, williscarto.com). “French-Australian” (most likely Alsatian or central-European Jewish background; Suzanne Rutland calls him a “Scarf employee from 1972–1975, working as a trouble-shooter for Australian trade in the Middle East”). Lived in flat at Blues Point Tower, McMahons Point, Sydney.
• From 11 November 1975 — Book of Leaks p.75: Bill Hartley approached Sydney clothier Reuben F. Scarf “immediately after the Whitlam Government was sacked on November 11, 1975, to seek donations from the Middle East”; Scarf’s employee Henry Fischer “was assigned to go to the Middle East to search for funds”. (Same page, in passing: “A Fischer neighbour in the Blues Point Tower building was the publisher Rupert Murdoch.”)
• 16 November 1975 — Whitlam and David Combe call on Fischer at his Blues Point Tower flat (in some accounts the meeting was on the margins of the 16 Nov ALP National Executive). Fischer agrees to act as Labor’s Middle-East emissary.
• Late November 1975 — Fischer flies to Baghdad; meets senior Iraqi ministers (per his account, including Saddam Hussein).
• 10 December 1975 — Breakfast meeting at Fischer’s Blues Point Tower flat with Whitlam, Combe and two Iraqi officials (Book of Leaks p.75 lists the Australians present as “Whitlam, Combe and Fischer”; Bill Hartley — the channel’s instigator — is placed at the breakfast in some later accounts but not in Book of Leaks) — later identified by US-intelligence intercepts as Farouk Al Jezirah Yeeyah (Yahya) and Ghafil Jassem Al-Tikriti (Iraqi Mukhabarat / nephew of Saddam, per the CIA’s own Tikriti-clan paper CIA-RDP88T00096R000400540002-8). The Iraqis allegedly promise US$500,000 in election funds, to be handed over in Hong Kong/Tokyo. Fischer’s three explicit asks (per his own later sworn statement, AJHS Journal 2015): (i) a more even-handed Middle East policy; (ii) intelligence-sharing on Middle East affairs; (iii) “assurance that Bob Hawke would not become Labor Party leader.” Book of Leaks p.70 (not p.74 as an earlier draft had) explains the signals intelligence: the intercepts — “Umbra” being “the code word for signals intelligence” — “occurred in Japan, and involved reports sent from the Iraqi Embassy there to Iraq”; they were not recordings of the breakfast itself; “the two diplomats … along with the funds intermediary Henry Fischer, went directly from Sydney to Tokyo”; and per the same US sources the “diplomats” were “in fact, members of the Iraqi Secret Service”. Separately, p.74 records the claim that one of Fischer’s partners bugged the breakfast itself.
• 13 December 1975 — Federal election; Labor loses. The US$500,000 never arrives.
• 17 February 1976 — Fischer phones Rupert Murdoch in London from Paris.
• 20 February 1976 — Fischer arrives in London and gives Murdoch a 40-page sworn statement in Murdoch’s London offices; a London-based ASIO officer sits in on the interviews (Book of Leaks p.75).
• 25 February 1976 — Laurie Oakes (Melbourne Sun News-Pictorial) “broke the Iraqi story on February 25”; “when early wind of Oakes’ report appeared”, Murdoch (writing under “Special Correspondent”) rushed The Australian’s own version — “Iraq promises $US500,000 to pay Labor’s debts / Whitlam in secret Arab election deal” — into the same day’s paper, “based on information given him by Fischer eight days earlier” (Book of Leaks p.75). Tiffen (2025) adds that Fraser’s office tipped Murdoch that Oakes’s story was coming. An earlier draft of this file had Murdoch “eight days ahead of” Oakes — an inversion of the Book of Leaks sentence: the eight days refer to when Fischer briefed Murdoch, and the two papers published simultaneously.
• Post-election, 1976 — Book of Leaks p.75: Fischer’s 40-page London statement “contained a number of wild claims” which the new Prime Minister, Malcolm Fraser, later made to three journalists in background briefings in his Canberra office — e.g. that the $500,000 had actually been handed over at the 10 December meeting, and that Whitlam had promised to provide sensitive information on Israel to Iraq. “There is no evidence, however, that Whitlam made any promises; nor did he get any money.”
• 26 February 1976 — US Embassy Canberra reports the story in cable 1976CANBER01477.
• 27 February 1976 — Whitlam tells US Ambassador Hargrove privately that he expects to be ousted “within a week” and confirms awareness of the Coombe/Hartley Iraqi-funding attempt (cable 1976CANBER01553, SECRET) — see WikiLeaks PlusD section.
• 3 March 1976 — HoR Hansard p. 472–4: Killen, Peacock, Abel/Ellicott exchange on Fischer’s police-protection request from Singapore and the Reuben Scarf breakfast.
• March 1976 onwards — Murdoch puts Fischer under the protection of bodyguard Douglas Sinclair.
• Singapore Hilton, c.1976 — Fischer disappears from his hotel room in the company of one Tito Howard (“known to do dirty work for Arab dictators”); Sinclair tells the Age’s Singapore correspondent Michael Richardson he had been knocked out. Howard later contacts Murdoch in London offering a video of “an Australian politician engaging in a major indiscretion”; Murdoch declines.
• Los Angeles Superior Court, c.1979–80s — A sworn statement (cited Book of Leaks p.74 but no docket number given) records that the Iraqis did provide US$500,000 and that Fischer disappeared with the money. (The major California case in which Fischer is later a named defendant is Legion for the Survival of Freedom, Inc. v. Willis Carto, Henry Fischer, Vibet, Inc., Liberty Lobby, Inc. — Case N64584 in the Superior Court of California, County of San Diego, Dept 11, Hon. Runston G. Maino, trial Oct 1996, judgment US$6,430,000 — but that case post-dates Book of Leaks.)
• Later — Fischer settles in California (Pine Heights Way, northern San Diego County, fortified estate) and becomes active in far-right politics (Willis Carto / Liberty Lobby / Institute for Historical Review orbit); David Greason in Australia/Israel Review 15–28 June 1994 was the first to disclose this. Fischer was a named defendant in Legion for the Survival of Freedom, Inc. v. Willis Carto, Henry Fischer, Vibet, Inc., Liberty Lobby, Inc. — Case N64584, Superior Court of California, County of San Diego, Dept 11, Hon. Runston G. Maino — trial October–November 1996, judgment US$6,430,000 for plaintiff. Book of Leaks concludes: “other sources strongly suggest that Fischer may have been an intelligence agent working for the US Government.”
• As of late 2025–early 2026 — Henri Fischer appears to be still alive (aged ≈ 89/90), per Rodney Tiffen, “Best of 2025 – Rupert Murdoch’s greatest scoop” (Pearls and Irritations, 7 Jan 2026), which treats him in the present tense.

The bearing on Khemlani: Toohey & Wilkinson argue (p.74) that the same US$ paid to Khemlani in 1975 (the US$400,000 from “a private US company”) and the US$500,000 promised to Whitlam via Fischer were both early-active operations of the same intelligence-financial network — the question being who, exactly. Their tentative answer points to the Commerce International / Task Force 157 / CIA Helliwell-Mercantile-Bank complex that surfaces again in the 1985 Marian Wilkinson Nugan Hand investigation.

Khemlani in Hansard 1975–1980 — guide for editors

From a Historic Hansard sweep (282 fragment hits for “Khemlani” 1975–80) the most substantive debates are these. Full URLs at historichansard.net.

• 11 June 1975 Senate — Sen. Guilfoyle on Dolmac Consultants / Khemlani.
• 12 June 1975 Senate — first substantive debate; Jessop: “Who is Mr Khemlani? Where are his headquarters?”
• 9 July 1975 HoR (special sitting) — Connor tables papers naming “Mr Tirath Hassaram Khemlani, Manager, Dalamal & Sons (Commodities) Ltd, 8 West Eaton Place”.
• 9 July 1975 Senate — President’s statement re Khemlani introduction.
• 17 July 1975 Senate — Sen. Young: “Mr Karidis and no doubt through to Mr Khemlani in London”.
• 22 July 1975 Senate — Senate Select Committee hearings; Sen. Hall: “Did Mr Karidis or Mr Khemlani press the Government for funds?”
• 2 September 1975 HoR — Whitlam’s written answers to Lynch’s Questions on Notice 2939–2943 (an earlier draft of this file mislabelled this day “Connor’s resignation day”): Q2939 asks whether Connor “held discussions with Mr Tirath Khemlani in Sydney on 22 March 1975” and whether a second US$4 billion (US$8 billion cumulative) was flagged — Whitlam’s answer points to Connor’s letter of 22 March 1975 to Khemlani (Hansard, 9 July 1975, p.3622); Q2943 concerns Khemlani’s arrangements for disbursing a US$180m commission, citing a letter of 27 December 1974 signed by Khemlani; another answer denies Connor signed promissory notes or knew the Württembergische Bank.
• 9 October 1975 Senate / HoR — Withers, Wriedt, J. McClelland; Anthony, Katter.
• 14 October 1975 HoR — Sinclair: “whether he has ever met Mr Khemlani. If so, where and when?” — Whitlam: “Mr Speaker, no.” (p.2035; the basis of the oft-quoted “I have never met Mr Khemlani”). Anthony presses on the statutory declaration; Whitlam explains accepting Connor’s resignation (telexes delivered by Messrs Con and Corr, published in the Melbourne Herald).
• 15 October 1975 HoR — Whitlam rules out a royal commission; Khemlani “may consider that he has some cause of action”; Garland’s question on notice re the “October initiatives through Mr Michael Murphy” and any Khemlani/Harris connection.
• 16 October 1975 Senate — Wood, Wriedt (“As far as the Government is concerned, Mr Khemlani does not exist any more”), Carrick (Bank of Paris / Bank of India telex 1 Sept), Georges (Melbourne Herald exclusive).
• 21 October 1975 Senate — Greenwood: Karidis intermediary; Khemlani as “scout for money”; “the 13 Dec 1974 Exec Council minute”.
• 22 October 1975 HoR — Whitlam denies Tim Anderson contact, references Karidis/Anderson; Lynch on the “Khemlani and Phillip Cairns files”.
• 28 October 1975 HoR — Whitlam: “many contacts with increasing frequency”; Fraser: “Forget all these loans; say goodbye to Mr Khemlani”.
• 28 October 1975 Senate — President’s letter from Lynch re Khemlani Senate appearance; Everett: immigration without visa; James McClelland (Immigration Minister): New York attorneys’ Friday-night visa inquiry, “the usual transit facilities … another 72 hours”, “the Opposition’s client”.
• 29 October 1975 Senate / HoR — Douglas McClelland: the Opposition’s holding notice means it will not call Khemlani to the Bar; James McClelland: “the orchestration of the previous arrival of Mr Khemlani … a fizzer”; Wriedt; Hayden: “star performer”. McIntosh: “another Petrov. It has fallen flat.”
• 30 October 1975 Senate — Wriedt: “a gentleman by the name of Khemlani who has all the evidence to damn”; Carrick; Chaney; Gietzelt: “all its eggs into the Khemlani basket”; Sim; Georges (call before chamber); Primmer; Everett; Hall.
• 4 November 1975 Senate — Major debate after Lynch produced eight briefcases of Khemlani documents in Sydney 13 Oct.
• 5 November 1975 Senate, pp. 1741-62 — Wheeldon: extensive — Khemlani’s photocopied passport, statutory declaration on Connor meetings, midnight office procedure.
• 6 November 1975 Senate — Wriedt on Karidis contradiction of stat dec.
• 11 November 1975 (Dismissal day) HoR — Fraser: “his agent, his intermediary, the person who was good enough to pursue $4,000m for this Government for 12 months”; Frank Crean (not Whitlam): “the issue is not about the unholy relic, Khemlani”.
• 23 March 1976 Senate — Keeffe: Bjelke-Petersen / Wiley Fancher private inquiry into the Khemlani loans affair costing >$250,000.
• 6 May 1976 HoR — Lionel Bowen: Khemlani’s money “from a knight in Queensland … a source very close to the Country Party” (Gunn, per Freney’s identification — Bowen never utters the name); Lynch’s “slush funds”, Licardy’s and Andrew Hay’s bills; calls for a royal commission into who paid Khemlani.
• 8 November 1977 Senate — Steele Hall on Gateway Motel; Withers’s “old potato chips and monkey nuts” reply.
• 31 May 1979 HoR — Blewett, “Iraqi breakfast”.
• 10 October 1979 Senate — Messner, Carrick, D. McClelland: full Khemlani retrospect.
• 7 November 1979 Senate — Walsh: “poring over Khemlani’s suitcases in Sydney on or about 13 October 1975”.
• 16 September 1980 HoR, p. 1291 — Fraser: “Mr Tirath Khemlani could be given some kind of roving commission.”

No substantive Khemlani debate after 1980; nothing in 1985 around the Stewart RC or the Wilkinson Nugan Hand article; no death/condolence motion in 1991.

US State Department cables on WikiLeaks PlusD

≈20 declassified cables, listed chronologically. Khemlani-direct cables are bolded.

Also indexed at archive.org as State-Dept-cable-1975-145926, State-Dept-cable-1975-287367, State-Dept-cable-1975-294807, StateDeptcable1977-203932.

NAA file series — Loans Affair

From NAA Fact Sheet 239:

Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet - A1209, 1975/1237 part 1 — Overseas loan raisings – Khemlani arrangements (11 files) - A1209, 1975/2253 — Papers from Min. of Minerals and Energy obtained 29 Oct 1975 - A1209, 1975/2400 part 1 — Khemlani statutory declaration of 3 November 1975 (3 files) - A1209, 1975/2494 part 1 — Middle East loan offer (8 files) - A1209, 1975/2525–2529 — Communications between Mr Connor / Sir Lenox Hewitt and Mr Khemlani – 14 November 1974 to 6 January 1975 (5 files) - A8446, 5 — Overseas loans raising – documentation from Minerals and Energy - A8446, 18 — Confidential – overseas loans

Attorney-General’s Department - A432, A1975/484 part 1 — Proposed borrowing of $2000 million through Mr Khemlani (7 files) - A432, A1975/7850 — Connor file - A432, A1975/7851 — Sir Lenox Hewitt file

Treasury - A571, 1975/96 part 1 — Middle East loan offer to Department of Minerals and Energy (10 files) - A571, 1975/3944 part 1 — Overseas loans – transactions – funny money – Senate resolution (2 files)

Federal Executive Council - A1573, 1974/9 — Minute papers approved 1974 (includes the 13 Dec 1974 minute) - A1573, 1975/8 — Minute papers approved 1975

Clyde Cameron personal papers - M3865, 167 — The loans affair – affidavit regarding Khemlani (7 files) - M3865, 177 — The loans affair – regarding Cairns and Harris

Jim Cairns personal papers - M1567, Box 1/4 — Correspondence between Dr J F Cairns and Mr George Harris

Sir Clarence Harders (Secretary, A-G’s Dept) personal papers — the most underused set: - M4081, 1/1 — borrowing for ‘temporary purposes’ advice - M4081, 1/6 — A-G’s Dept involvement in Khemlani negotiations - M4081, 1/10 — request to Dept of Minerals and Energy - M4081, 1/12 — summary of Connor/Khemlani correspondence - M4081, 1/15 — Loans affair – investigations – enquiries to Scotland Yard (the file that confirms Khemlani’s fraud was discoverable in days but the Driver/Drover and Johnson Matthey references trumped the police-check) - M4081, 1/28 — proposals to include overseas loan raising on Loans Council agenda - M4081, 1/29 — interdepartmental discussions re Khemlani negotiations

For Khemlani’s personal ASIO file, search RecordSearch under “Khemlani” / “Hassaram” / “Tirathdas” in series A6119, A8911, A12389. The 1981 ASIO referral (US authorities → ASIO) implies a 1981–82 PF if one exists.

Open research leads (for the Wikipedia editor or any historian)

1. EDNY archived case records (NARA Record Group 21, EDNY criminal docket 1980–81, U.S. v. Khemlani) — would give Bolling’s full deposition, the actual indictment (resolving the conflicting dates: Book of Leaks prints “February 29, 1980” but narrates it after the 5 Feb 1981 bail release), the disposition, the names of the four bail sureties including M.L. Wooldridge, and the two-sureties-allegedly-NJ-Mafia identifications.
2. FBI Vault FOIA file on Tirath Khemlani / “KHEMLANI, TIROTH” — Charles Bolling’s case file. The FOIA logs at archive.org/details/FBIFOIALogs confirm the FBI holds a file under that subject heading.
3. National Records of Scotland — statutory death register entry for Paisley district, 19 May 1991, plus burial/cremation record; also marriage register entry for Paisley, 14 Nov 1968 (Hassaram/Lambe). The 1964 Scottish bankruptcy register (Scottish Court of Session) for “Tirath Hassaram” / “Tirathdas Hassaram”.
4. Mitchell Library, Glasgow — Glasgow Herald archive 1959–66 (Vaughan/fire trial — only 11/12 May 1964 day-1 coverage is currently retrievable; the verdict and sentencing days would be informative); Paisley Daily Express archive 1991 (death and funeral notices).
5. Singapore corporate register (ACRA) — full filing for Labrador Drilling & Engineering (Singapore) Pte Ltd 1987 (including Shanti’s address and the names of all directors); also any Khemlani-related shell companies 1974–80, including Globe Control Finance and Trade Co.
6. Edinburgh Gazette / London Gazette — full chase of T. Hassaram & Co Ltd, Castle Manufacturing Co, Khemlani & Co (Manchester) Ltd, K B & Co (Manchester) Ltd, and K B (Import & Export) Ltd filings (Companies House 01490164).
7. “AG Tall Man” identification — the Yu→Khemlani telex of 12 Dec 1974 cited by Book of Leaks p.72 names a Whitlam-Government insider in or close to the Department of Minerals and Energy / PM’s Office who briefed Khemlani’s intermediaries the day before the EXCO loan authority. Nobody in Hocking, Kelly, Reid, Hall or Bramston has tried to identify this person. This is a publishable original-research lead.
8. NAA M4081/1/15 (Harders) and the Wheeler tape transcripts (National Times November 1982).
9. The two NJ bail sureties whom the FBI itself regarded as Mafia agents — names sit in the EDNY file.
10. Henri Fischer — California real-property records (Pine Heights Way, San Diego County); LA Superior Court 1976–85 case search; whether Fischer’s death has ever been confirmed.

Useful primary and secondary sources

Primary records

• TNA HO 334/871/35287 — naturalisation cert 12 Apr 1961.
• London Gazette — Issue 45518, 11 November 1971, p.12293 (bankruptcy petition/receiving order; the adjudication and later notices ran in subsequent issues); 22 July 1968 (Khemlani & Co Ltd liquidation); 17 Nov / 10 Dec 1982 (K B & Co Ltd / T. Khemlani Director); Gobind Dalamal deed-poll 8 May 1970.
• Edinburgh Gazette — T. Hassaram & Co Ltd notices 1964–86 (incl. 29 Dec 1986 Gerald Ian Rankin appointment).
• Evening Times (Glasgow), 11 May 1964; Glasgow Herald, 12 May 1964 (Vaughan/fire case).
• New Straits Times (Singapore), 24 May 1974 — Thomas Simson & Co Ltd notice.
• The Age, 23 May 1975, p.1 — “I gave loan letter: Connor”.
• The Age, 18 June 1976, p.6 — “Khemlani on move again in dollar chase” (Ben Hills).
• Canberra Times, 14 Feb 1976, p.5 — “London writ against Khemlani”.
• Canberra Times, 13 Sep 1991, p.1 — “Tirath Khemlani dead at 70” (Trove 122383735).
• The Age, 13 Sep 1991 — “Whitlam’s Nemesis, Khemlani, Is Dead”.
• Canberra Times, 7 Aug 1994 — John Farquharson, “OBITUARY: Sir Frederick Wheeler” (Trove 118260996).
• Tribune (Sydney), 19 Aug 1981, p.7 — “Khemlani admits Mafia link” (Toohey) (Trove 259979432).
• Hansard, House of Representatives & Senate, 1975–80 — selected list above.
• US State Dept cables on WikiLeaks PlusD — full list above.
• NAA file series A1209, A1573, A432, A571, A8446, M3865, M1567, M4081 — listed above.
• UK Companies House — K B (Import & Export) Limited 01490164.

Secondary works

• Toohey, Brian & Wilkinson, Marian. The Book of Leaks: Exposes in Defence of the Public’s Right to Know. Angus & Robertson, 1987. ISBN 9780207155086. Pages 70–75 are the primary source for the EDNY prosecution detail.
• Wilkinson, Marian. “Khemlani link with Nugan Hand.” The National Times, 15–21 November 1985, pp. 20 & 22 — first disclosure of the Cayman / Odyssey Trading / Project Olives material.
• Freney, Denis. Get Gough! How the CIA & Rupert Murdoch overthrew Gough Whitlam. Tribune (special), October 1985. Ch. 2 “The Khemlani Affair”, pp. 5–11. Full text archive.org.
• Kwitny, Jonathan. The Crimes of Patriots: A True Tale of Dope, Dirty Money, and the CIA. W. W. Norton, 1987. Borrow-only on archive.org.
• Kwitny, Jonathan. “The Great Dingo Hunt.” Mother Jones, Feb–Mar 1984, vol. 9 no. 2, p.67.
• Kwitny, Jonathan. “The CIA’s Hidden Hand in Down Under.” Foreign Policy, No.49, Winter 1982–83, p.199.
• Whitlam, Gough. The Truth of the Matter. Penguin 1979 (p.222); revised 1983 (p.230); revised 2005.
• Sexton, Michael. Illusions of Power: The Fate of a Reform Government. Allen & Unwin, 1979 — p.334.
• Kelly, Paul. The Dismissal. Angus & Robertson, 1983 — reissue of The Unmaking of Gough (1976). p.374.
• Pilger, John. A Secret Country. Jonathan Cape 1989 / Knopf 1990 — pp. 156–158 / p.346.
• Page, Bruce. The Murdoch Archipelago. Simon & Schuster, 2003.
• Hocking, Jenny. Gough Whitlam: His Time. Miegunyah Press, 2012 — Vol. 2, pp. 363–4 (Iraqi affair) and Loans Affair chapter.
• Uren, Tom. Straight Left. Random House, 1995 — pp. 236–7.
• Souter, Gavin. Acts of Parliament: A Narrative History of the Senate and House of Representatives, Commonwealth of Australia. Melbourne University Press, 1988, p.714 — Wheeler/Whitlam dialogue. (Corrected attribution; an earlier draft listed this under “Bowen, Lionel”, a book that does not exist.)
• Oakes, Laurie. Crash Through or Crash. 1976, p.135 — alleged US$250,000 payment.
• Gordon, Harry. An Eyewitness History of Australia. Penguin, 1988, p.510 — reprints Peter Game’s Khemlani interview.
• Bolton, Geoffrey. Oxford History of Australia, Vol. 5, p.374.
• Bell, Coral. Dependent Ally, p.250 — the “K1/K2/K3” Treasury naming convention.
• Carney, Shaun. Australian Moment. Viking, 2012, p.67.
• Coxsedge, Joan, Coldicutt, Ken & Harant, Gerry. Rooted in Secrecy: The Clandestine Element in Australian Politics. Committee for the Abolition of Political Police, 1982 — pp. 40, 237, 262.
• Karidis, Gerry (with Brian Abbey). Building, Always Building: The Life and Times of Gerry Karidis, AM. Wakefield Press, 2012. ISBN 9781862549678.
• For the Hewitt strand: the Canberra Times obituary “Sir Lenox Hewitt was a mandarin respected and feared by leaders” (2020) and the People Australia entry for Sir Cyrus Lenox (Len) Hewitt (1917–2020). (An earlier draft of this file listed “Ian Hancock, National Treasure: The Spies & Bureaucrats of Sir Cyrus Lenox Hewitt” — no such book could be verified to exist; Hancock’s actual biographies are of Gorton, Greiner, Hughes and Gotto. Removed.)
• Reynolds, Wayne. ADB entry “Khemlani, Tirath Hassaram (1920–1991)” — adb.anu.edu.au and oa.anu.edu.au.
• Wolfensohn, James D. A Global Life: My Journey Among Rich and Poor, from Sydney to Wall Street to the World Bank. PublicAffairs, 2010. ISBN 9781586482558. p.168 — the “con man” judgement.
• Lloyd, Clem & Clark, Andrew. Kerr’s King Hit. Cassell Australia, 1976. NLA cat. 2185872. The original print source for the “Sheikh Sikkar Gassan” / Dorchester Hotel claim (pp. 141–2), which is otherwise un-attested.
• Freney, Denis. Get Gough! How the CIA & Rupert Murdoch overthrew Gough Whitlam. Tribune (special), October 1985. Full text on archive.org including a detailed appendix of “loans affair” players.
• Stewart, Donald (Royal Commissioner). Final Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Activities of the Nugan Hand Group. Parliamentary Paper 369/1985. NLA catalogue 2096210. Vol. 2 digitised.
• Bramston, Troy. “The Iraqi Money Scandal, 40 Years On.” Quadrant, March 2016 and follow-up April 2024.
• Tiffen, Rodney. “Rupert Murdoch’s greatest scoop.” Pearls and Irritations, 12 September 2025; republished as “Best of 2025”, 7 January 2026. (Byline verified against the page; an earlier draft of this file credited “Bowman & Stine”.)
• Dorling, Philip. “How Murdoch got his biggest scoop.” The Age / Narooma News, 10 Nov 2012 — reprint.
• Rutland, Suzanne. “Whitlam’s Shifts in Foreign Policy 1972–1975.” AJHS Journal 22(2), 2015.
• Game, Peter. Lifetime profile by John Trevorrow, Melbourne Press Club (2000). And Melbourne Press Club Hall of Fame entry.
• New Dawn Magazine. “Coup d’État in Australia: 20 Years of Cover-Up.” New Dawn.
• AIM Network. “The Anglo-American ambush of the Whitlam Government — 11.11.1975 (Part 2).” theaimn.com.
• CovertAction Magazine (Nov 2023). “New Investigation Exposes CIA Role in 1975 Coup against Australian Government.” covertactionmagazine.com — caution: this source asserts the “Thomas Ho-lung Yu / Flying Tigers / CAT / Civil Air Transport / Spyros Fassoulis” detail (treat with care; corroborate independently).
• ProPublica. “After Disappearing from Australia, a CIA-Linked Fugitive Found in Idaho.” propublica.org — Michael Hand confirmed in Idaho 2015.

Wikipedia history — what already exists, what was removed, where the gaps are

A standalone Wikipedia article Tirath Khemlani existed from 18 November 2005 (created by user Jack Upland) to 7 July 2009, when it was merged into Loans affair by user Surturz citing WP:BLP1E (notable for one event only). There was no AfD discussion. The merged article ran to ~5.4 KB in 2008; today’s Loans affair is ~12.7 KB (April 2026). Content lost in the merge and not restored:

• The 1981 New York stolen-securities arrest;
• The trans-Australia gas-pipeline rationale for the loan;
• The obscurity period 1981–1991;
• The “Old Rice and Monkey Nuts” nickname (removed by editor Sfaiku on 18 July 2008; also removed from Loans affair by B P Hogan on 1 August 2024).

Wikidata Q48515754 exists for Khemlani (sources only the ADB; no Wikipedia sitelink in any language). A recreation of Tirath Khemlani as a standalone article would not collide with anything and would simply attach to that existing Wikidata item.

Adjacent Wikipedia coverage: - Loans affair — current target of the redirect; ~12.7 KB. - 1975 Australian constitutional crisis — two short paragraphs mention Khemlani. - Nugan Hand Bank — no mention of Khemlani. - Michael Jon Hand — no mention. - Rex Connor — one-sentence mention. - Stewart Royal Commission — no Khemlani mention. - Bill Hartley (activist) — exists; brief mention of Iraqi affair. - William Archer Gunn — exists; confirms 1975 attempted petrodollar borrowing. - Iraqi loans affair / Iraqi money scandal — no Wikipedia article exists (404, no redirect). - Henri Fischer / Henry Fischer — no Wikipedia article exists (the disambig “Henry Fischer” lists five unrelated people). - Gerry Karidis — no Wikipedia article exists. - Reuben Scarf — no Wikipedia article exists (he is briefly mentioned as a 1977 Call-to-Australia Senate candidate).

Reliability and gradient — for a future Wikipedia article