Mumbai: In what could spell more trouble for former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh, another offence of extortion has been registered against him along with his trusted man API Sachin Waze, who was dismissed from service after being arrested in the Antilla bomb scare – Mansukh Hiran murder case by the National Investigation Agency (NIA).
The complaint was registered by 48-year-old Bimal Agarwal, a developer and private contractor, who has alleged that Waze in connivance with Singh and others extorted Rs 8 lakh and two high-end mobile phones totally worth Rs 11.92 lakh from him between February 2020 to March 2021 so that his resto-bars in Western Suburbs could function smoothly. Agarwal is a partner in "BOHO" located in Goregaon and "BCB" located at Vira Desai Road in Andheri.
Agarwal in his statement has claimed that Param Bir Singh had asked Waze to collect Rs 2 crore on a daily basis from bar owners and bookies in Mumbai. This is the first FIR where Param Bir Singh and dismissed police officer Waze have been named together.
Besides Singh and Waze, Agarwal has named Sumit Singh alias Chintu, Alpesh Patel, Vinay Singh and Riyaz Bhati in the FIR registered at the Goregaon police station on Thursday.
In his statement to the police, Agrawal has also claimed that on August 31 2020, Waze had called him to Kandivali unit of the crime branch and informed that Singh had said that, he has suffered loss of 6 months of income due to pandemic and to make recoveries Singh had given a target to collect Rs 2 crore daily. Waze was also asked to tap into bookies and to let them operate so that money could be collected from them, stated Agrawal in his statement to the police.
Based on the complaint the Goregaon police have registered an offence under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 384, 384 and 34.
