The National Investigation Agency (NIA), which is probing Antilia bomb scare and Mansukh Hiran murder case, has claimed that the mystery woman spotted with Sachin Vaze in CCTV footage is a 36-years-old single mother who has been in regular touch with him from 2011. The ‘mystery woman’ was seen in the CCTV camera along with the dismissed cop of Mumbai police at a five-star hotel in South Mumbai.
The woman has revealed to the NIA that she was working as an escort when Vaze met him as a client through a broker at a five-star hotel. She said that she doesn’t exactly remember whether Vaze had introduced himself as ‘Sanjay’ or ‘Sunil’ adding that after a few meetings he had revealed his name but not the profession. He introduced himself as a businessman. She further stated that she also used whitewash black money of Vaze.
Mother of a 13-year old son, she became an escort in 2008 as her unemployed and abusive husband forced her to pick this profession. In 2013 she got separated from him.
During the investigation, the investigative agency had spotted her entering Oberoi hotel on February 18 and leaving the hotel the next day. She disclosed that she had stayed with Sachin Vaze at the hotel on two occasions in February as Vaze had given her cash of Rs 40 and Rs 36 lakh to count and sort. The first consignment of Rs 40 lakh cash she had received from Vaze was on the 4th floor of the office of police commissioner in Mumbai either on February 15 or the next day. She took the currency notes to her Mira road residence in a local train. Vaze directed her to remove old soiled notes and segregate notes having “786” as serial numbers.
The woman said that when she left the hotel on February 19, Sachin Vaze again gave him a bag containing Rs 36 lakh which she returned to Vaze on February 20 after sorting.
She told the NIA that she had a bank locker which she jointly used along with Vaze. Few days after Vaze was arrested, she had removed Rs 5 lakh from the locker. She gave this money to her brother to hire a good lawyer in case her name surfaces in the NIA investigation. She also left for her hometown with her son on March 31. But she returned after her brother informed her that the NIA was looking for her.
The NIA has also detected Rs 1.5 crore cash in the account of a company Mayank Automation. The woman is mentioned as proprietor of the said company.
Sachin Vaze who remained suspended for 16 years was reinstated in June 2020 after which he asked the woman to stop working as an escort. Soon after that, he had started paying Rs 50,000 monthly to her from August 2020 onward so that she meets her expenses and they regularly used to meet in hotels in South Mumbai.
The NIA on September 3 submitted a charge sheet against Sachin Vaze as the key accused in the Antilia bomb scare case and the other related cases running over into 10000 pages has also recorded the statement of that mystery woman.
On the morning of February 25, 2021, a Scorpio car laden along with 12 gelatin sticks and a threat letter was found parked on Carmichael Road outside Antilia, the house of industrialist Mukesh Ambani. Later on the owner of the car, Mansukh Hiran was found dead. After that, the NIA took over the investigation and arrested Vaze as a key conspirator.
