Drug trafficker Lalit Patil has been remanded to Yerawada Central Jail by a special court in the city late on Friday. Alongside Patil, the court also remanded Jishan Sheikh, Shivaji Shinde, and Rahul Pandit to judicial custody. Additionally, the court extended the police custody of Patil's brother Bhushan Patil, along with Harish Pant, Arvind Kumar Lohare, and Ibrahim Shaikh until November 29.
Earlier, the police invoked provisions of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) against Patil and his associates.
Patil, the primary accused in a ₹300 crore mephedrone seizure case, was arrested in Bengaluru on October 17, over two weeks after his escape from the government-run Sassoon Hospital. A trustee of an educational institute in the city was arrested for facilitating his hospital escape.
The Pune police, on September 30, apprehended an individual outside Sassoon hospital and seized mephedrone worth ₹2 crore from him. The investigation led to the arrest of a hospital canteen employee who claimed that Patil supplied the drugs while he was admitted to the hospital.
Patil then escaped from the hospital on October 2 during a visit for X-ray imaging. Arrested in 2022 in a drug case in Chakan, Pune district, he had been housed in Pune's Yerawada prison and subsequently admitted to the hospital for the past three months.
According to police sources, Patil was driven by the fear of spending the rest of his life in jail after another case was registered against him on September 30 and hence escaped from the hospital. "The court did not grant Patil bail in the case of drug possession in Chakan for three years. He was scared after the second case was registered against him on September 30. Patil has confessed in the police investigation that he escaped from Sassoon Hospital because he was afraid that he would have to stay in jail for the rest of his life," police sources said.
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September 30 - Pune police apprehend an individual outside Sassoon Hospital and seize mephedrone worth ₹2 crore from him
October 2 - Lalit Patil escapes from Sassoon Hospital on October 2 during a visit for X-ray imaging
October 17 - Saki Naka police nab Patil from Bengaluru
