Thane: The Thane Police on Tuesday filed its charge sheet against Iqbal Kaskar, brother of 26/11 prime accused Dawood Ibrahim, for allegedly extorting a Thane-based builder of money and four flats. The charge sheet has also named Dawood’s close aide Chhota Shakeel and other known or unknown gangsters, besides co-accused Israr Jamil Sayyed, Mumtaz Ejaz Shaikh and Pankaj Gangar.
PI Rajkumar Kothmire, who is with the Thane Police Anti-Extortion Cell (AEC) and the investigating officer in the case, said, “We have filed the charge sheet, running into 1,645 pages, before the Thane Special MCOCA Court today against the accused in the extortion case registered by builder Suresh Jain. The accused have been charged under IPC sections 384, 386, 387, 34 and 120(B), and Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act sections 3(1)(ii), 3(2), 3(4) and 3(5), registered by the Kasarvadavali police station.”
Mr. Kothmire said the charge sheet pertains to the first of three extortion case against Mr. Kaskar and others, in which they extorted four flats in Mr. Jain’s project, and ₹30 lakh. All the accused are currently in judicial custody till December 2. He added that details of the investigations, including Mr. Kaskar’s visits to Thane in 2016 and 2017, how his associates, Mr. Sayyed and Mr. Shaikh, helped him in taking forcible possession of the four flats in the residential project on Ghodbunder Road are highlighted in the charge sheet.
The evidence against the accused includes phone call records, in which they allegedly threatened builders and developers in Dawood’s name. It also lists how Mr. Sayyed was found occupying one of the four flats when the Thane Police’s Anti-Extortion Cell (AEC) raided the premises in September, after the builder complained.
Police have said Mr. Kaskar allegedly sold the other three flats and the money was laundered, which is a separate investigation being conducted by the Enforcement Department, Mumbai since October.
Mr. Kaskar was picked up from his sister Hasina Parkar’s Nagpada residence on September 18 by a team led by Thane AEC chief Pradeep Sharma. Later, the Thane AEC registered two more cases against him, including one in which the three Kaskar brothers — Dawood, Anees and Iqbal — have been named as accused together for the first time.
Later, Thane Commissioner of Police Parambir Singh said Mr. Kaskar had been running the extortion racket since some time by threatening several realtors in Mumbai, Thane and Navi Mumbai, and at least three cases have been registered against him so far.
