MUMBAI: The city police made the first arrest in the
abetment
to suicide of a 30 year old tea stall owner who ended his life after
fraudsters
on the pretext of helping him mortage his property sold the property and used documents to avail loans for themselves. The deceased left a suicide note naming all the six persons.
The police on Thursday arrested 50-year old
Pydhonie
based
jeweller
Sahdev Karmakar who had shut his shop and was on the run for some time.
Police are now looking for Karmakar’s five accomplices in the crime namely Raguvendra Pujari, Piyush Shah, Mahroof Inamdar, Hemant Sawant, and Urvil Shah.
On June 11, last year, tea stall owner Tejas Mahatre a resident of Prabhadevi in Dadar committed suicide by hanging. The Dadar police initially registered an Accidental Death Report (ADR) however later his sister Jyotsna Autavkar lodged a complaint alleging that a few days prior to the suicide her brother Tejas was in depression. She said her brother Tejas Mhatre lived in Gharkul Co-operative Housing Society of Prabhadevi. Due to the ill health of Mhatre’s mother, Tejas had incurred a debt of Rs 6 to 7 lakh for her treatment. Tejas told his sister that he was unable to pay the heavy interest rate and hence he wanted to
mortgage
his house and take a lesser interest loan. “29 year old Tejas approached a few agents namely Raguvendra Pujari, Piyush Shah, Sahdev Karmakar, Mahroof Inamdar, Hemant Sawant, and Urvil Shah to seek a loan of Rs 25 lakhs.” said an officer.
These people took Tejas’s property papers and took Tejas and his brother Tushar to the registrar’s office, also taking the signatures of both of them. The accused had also taken all the documents of Tejas’s house to mortgage it. On June 10 when the bankers came to his house to recover the EMI, Tejas was shocked when they informed him that he had taken a loan of Rs 73 lakhs. Next day he committed suicide by hanging. During the course of investigations it has now come to light that out of Rs 73 lakhs received from the bank, Rs 36.50 lakh was transferred into the accounts of Mahroof Inamdar and Sahdev Karmakar, while Rs 25 lakh has gone to Ragvendra Pujari and Piyush Shah.
Jyotsna Otkar, told the police that Tejas had talked about taking a loan by mortgaging the house, but these people took advantage of Tejas’s ignorance and not only sold his house but also took a loan on it.
When the accused stopped paying the EMI after taking the loan, the bank employees started calling Tejas and visited his house to collect the money. Next day Tejas committed suicide. To establish that deceased committed suicide after being cheated, police recorded statements of various witnesses including Tejas’s brother Tushar and sister Jyotsna, the mobile Call Detail reports of the deceased and accused, bank statements, loan documents and inquest panchnama.
An official said that during the investigation it transpired that the same gang of accused had been arrested by the MHB colony police and Vile Parle police for similar cheatings.
