(Clockwise from top) Helkar, Jain and Reddy
Mateen Hafeez | TNN
Mumbai: The CBI arrested three persons, including an ex-Indian Air Force employee for cheating a chartered accountant of more than Rs 75 lakh on the pretext of helping him to sell his products and getting some of his projects pending with the government cleared.Those arrested are Prasanna Mehta alias S K Jain, Suryakant Helkar alias Captain and courier agent Shashank Abu. Jain owns two companies, Mehta Pharmaceuticals and Mehta Life Sciences and Research, while Helkar owns Carrugataded Boxers and Packing Material, Vikram Coropack Industries, Aero Head Packaging and Vikram Enterprises. The police is now looking for the gang leader, Venkta Reddy alias Srinivas Naidu alias Kalu alias Anna alias Dr Rao.
The arrested accused and Reddy also made a movie, Om Shanti, which is yet to release. Narrating the modus operandi, Rishi Raj Singh, joint director, CBI,said the complainant,S Suresh, a CA, would help IT firms sell their products. The gang learnt about Suresh’s plan to sell one such product which he found difficult to sell, considering some of his companies’ projects were stuck in red tape.
“Reddy and Suresh got in touch through phone. Suresh asked Reddy whether his company could help him sell the product, for which he would have to pay Rs 75 lakh. Suresh agreed to pay and Jain received the full amount through hawala,’’ said Singh, adding that when Suresh did not receive any help, he tried to contact Reddy, but in vain. Meanwhile, he came in touch with Jain who said he would help him get his money. “But Jain threatened Suresh that the Rs 75 lakh he paid was disputed in the company’s account and demanded Rs 15 lakh to settle the matter since the CBI had got information about the previous transaction,’’ added Singh.
The next day, Helkar called up Suresh posing as inspector Ram Singh of CBI, Mumbai, and demanded Rs 15 lakh bribe to settle the matter. Helkar had earlier worked with the Indian Air Force. After negotiation, Suresh agreed to pay Rs 4 lakh as the first installment. The money was paid to Helkar in Mumbai through a hawala operator in Hyderabad. “We were working on this case after the complaint for 20 days and first got hold of the courier agent of the hawala operator, Shashank Abu. After his arrest, Helkar and Jain were also arrested. Our six teams, two in Pune, two in Mumbai, one in Aurangabad and one in Hyderbad; were camping to arrest the suspects,’’ said the officials. The trio has confessed to their crime which they had been involved in for four years.
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