A 63-year-old man, a former employee of the State Bank of India (SBI), was cheated by a developer on the pretext of allotting a flat, to the tune of Rs. 88 lakhs.
Details of case
The victim, Vinay Wategoankar, a resident of Dadar, met a real estate agent in 2015 who introduced him to another man named Vishnu Jadhav. Jadhav said his boss is the owner of the apartment building named Navalkar, located in Ram Maruti Road, Dadar West, which he recently bought. The said building was about to be redeveloped, and he promised Vinay to provide a flat with an area of 407 square feet. The cost of the apartment was Rs. 65 lakhs, Vishnu said. However, since Vinay didn’t have that much money, Vishnu said he could pay him in parts.
Vinay, who had recently sold one of his properties based in Thane for Rs. 23 lakhs, decided to put the entire amount into this new Dadar flat. Vishnu’s firm goes by the name of Siddhivinayak Developers, to which Vinay paid Rs. 23 lakhs for the flat. Some months later, Vinay sold another of his properties based in Kandivali, and the Rs. 12 lakh he received, he transferred the entire amount to Vishnu. In the same year, another cheque of Rs. 10 lakh was provided to Vishnu, Vinay said. All the transactions that they exchanged had a receipt, but later, Vishnu stopped giving the receipt to Vinay.
Vinay alleges that he managed to pay the entire sum of Rs. 65 lakhs yet he didn’t get a receipt or update from the accused about the status of the property.
In February 2016, Vishnu came up with a new plan – he offered an extended apartment with a larger area in the same building. For this, he told Vinay that he would have to pay an additional Rs. 23 lakhs. In this new apartment, an additional 80 square feet would be added, Vishnu said. Thereby, on the pretext of added government formalities, Vinay ended up paying Rs. 88 lakhs to Vishnu and yet up till the year 2021, the latter should make no progress on the apartment or on the paid amount.
FIR registered with Shivaji Park police in Dadar
The victim waited for all these years expecting to hear from Vishnu about the apartment, but he didn't. Later, while Vinay inquired about the matter to some locals in the area, he got to know that he wasn’t the only one Vishnu was taking money from on the promise of a flat at Navalkar building. Vinay said, at least six people confirmed to him about Vishnu taking money from them.
On Sunday, Vinay approached the Shivaji Park police in Dadar and registered a first information report (FIR) against Vishnu on the charges of cheating and criminal breach of trust.
