In a fresh allegation against disgraced Mumbai police cop Sachin Vaze and controversial former Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh, celebrity car designer Dilip Chhabria has said that he was arrested in fake cases for not paying extortion money to Mumbai Police. Chhabria has alleged that the cops had tortured him demanding Rs 25 crore, before arresting him in various cases. He has also said that he had made the payment to save his family.
Earlier on 17th May, Chhabria had filed the complaint against the cops Sachin Vaze, Riyaz Kazi, and Prakash Howal, where he had said that he was framed in multiple cases by his ex-business partner and the police. He has also named complainants in the cases against him, who are comedian Kapil Sharma, former business associates Kiran Kumar and Sayed Afaaq, and his supplier Indermal Ramani, accusing them of conspiring against him.
“In January when I was arrested, Vaze told me that if I don’t pay up Rs 25 crore he will file 15 FIRs against me and keep me in jail for two years. In the coming days, three FIRs were filed against me. Before my arrest I had filed a complaint in November 2020 against my business partner. Rather than acting on my complaint, the police arrested me,” Chhabria said in the complaimt.
In an exclusive interview with Republic TV today, Dilip Chhabria said that he was harassed by the police by making him stand for more than 3 hours in police custody, he was not given food, until he gave into their demands. He said that he was arrested without any notice or summons, and as soon as he was taken to the Crime Intelligence Unit (CIU) office, Sachin Vaze told him that they will not arrest him if he pays Rs 25 crore. But as he refused to do so, he was arrested after some time.
Dilip Chhabria said that he was still forced to pay Rs 25 lakh, as the cops threatened to arrest his family members too if the amount was not paid within ten minutes. He said that faced with such a difficult situation, he had made the payment to protect his family from arrest. Chhabria informed that the money was paid to API Riyaz Kazi in the parking lot of CIU office. He said that he has not mentioned about this payment in his complaint, and he revealed the same for the first time in the interview with Republic TV.
The car designer said that he believes that Param Bir Singh was behind his arrest and his extortion, as the complains were made to Economic Offence Wing (EOW), and the EOW reports to Param Bir Singh, not Sachin Vaze. He also said that the complainant was actually a front-man of his partner, and his arrest was part of a conspiracy.
The complaint filed by the lawyers of Chhabria had said, “Sachin Vaze and Riyaz Kazi along with Prakash Howal threatened our client to give the extortion money, failing which his senior Mr. Param Bir Singh, the erstwhile Commissioner of Police, would make sure that the whole Chhabria family would die behind bars.”
Dilip Chhabria said that he was arrested on a fake complaint, and the complainant has deep connections with the cops who had arrested him. He said that the complainant was seen in the CIU office all the time, and used to travel with Sachin Vaze. Chhabria said that the complainant used to come to the CIU office in the black Mercedes car which has been seized by NIA in the Antilia bomb scare case against Vaze.
In fact, as the company of the complaint is in NCLT, the resolution professional of the NCLT had complained to the NCLT court that the complainant spends the whole day at CIU and EOW, and he has the blessings of Param Bir Singh.
The renowned car designer famous for his DC branded customised cars is currently on bail after he was arrested by the Crime Intelligence Unit (CIU) of the Mumbai Police Crime Branch led by Sachin Vaze. He was arrested in a cheating and forgery case on December 29, and later he was arrested in two other different cases. After his arrest in December, a spare parts supplier named Indermal Ramani had filed complaint alleging non-payment against supplies, and actor-comedian Kapil Sharma had registered a case against him alleging non delivering a vanity van after taking Rs 5.7 crore for the same. Two cases were filed against him by CIU, while one was filed by the EOW. Chhabria’s sister was also arrested by the cops. While she had secured anticipatory bail after his arrest, she was arrested in a different case.
Dilip Chhabria has rejected these allegations. He has that Kapil Sharma’s van was ready, but as the comedian didn’t respond about the final design, the work was delayed. The complaint by Chhabria says that CIU had summoned Sharma and forced him to file a complaint against the car designer so that he could be kept in jail for a longer time.
With Param Bir Singh alleging that former Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh had asked Sachin Vaze to extort money from businesses and later Sachin Vaze himself admitting the same, the allegations of Dilip Chhabria are significant. In view of the expose of the extortion racket run by Mumbai Police in the aftermath of the investigation into the Antilia Bomb Scare case, it seems likely that the car designer was a victim of the same extortion racket. And as he didn’t pay the demanded Rs 25 crore, he was forced spend over 100 days in jail before being released on bail.
