The Anti-Extortion Cell in Maharashtra’s Thane district arrested a private detective and his wife for allegedly extorting Rs 1 crore from suspended Indian Administrative Service officer Radheshyam Mopalwar, the police said on Friday.
Satish Mangle and his wife Shraddha were arrested on Thursday after they allegedly threatened to defame IAS officer Radheshyam Mopalwar, who has been sent on leave pending an inquiry, PTI reported. The couple told the officer that they would leak the recordings of his phone calls if they were not paid Rs 7 crore.
In August, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had suspended Mopalwar from the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation for allegedly amassing Rs 800 crore in disproportionate assets. He was the managing director of MSRDC. The move came after Satish Mangle released audio clips of Mopalwar purportedly asking for bribe for fixing a deal for a plot in Mumbai was leaked.
In October, the Mangles allegedly demanded money in exchange of the audio tapes and withdrawing the corruption complaint against him. They even threatened to kill the officer’s daughter if the amount was not paid. Mopalwar agreed to pay an upfront amount Rs 1 crore in Thane, IANS reported. He then recorded the threatening calls and submitted them to the Thane Police. The couple was arrested from their flat in Dombivali on Thursday.
“We have recovered two laptops, 15 CDs, five mobile handsets, four pen-drives, and other incriminating documents from their home,” Thane Police Commissioner Parambir Singh said.
The IAS officer was overseeing the Rs 46,000-crore Mumbai-Nagpur Super Communication Expressway when he was sacked.The three-member committee examining the case against Mopalwar will continue its investigation, despite the arrests of the Mangles, Hindustan Times reported. “The probe deals with their audio tapes and their authenticity,” Johny Joseph, heading the committee, told the newspaper.
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