Mumbai: Following court’s direction, the Chembur police have registered a case of money laundering against hotelier Manjit Singh Abrol and 10 others for allegedly selling and buying a land which has a government-aided school named Sind Cosmopolitan High School located in Chembur East for the past 65 years. Since the Chembur police did not initially register the FIR, the complainant moved the magistrate’s court at Kurla which directed the police to register the FIR and complete the investigation within two months.
The complainant is Dipak Inder Ahuja (51), who has been appointed as the principal of the school from 2009. According to Ahuja, the accused including Abrol have submitted multiple forged documents – deed of conveyance, letter of possession, general power of attorney and affidavit cum indemnity bond – for purchase and sale of the land which belongs to the school.
Alleged Involvement Of Heirs And Lack Of Transaction Records Raises Suspicions In Land Sale Investigation
The 10 accused excluding Abrol are Sunita Ramesh Mata, Pradip Ramesh Mata, Dinesh Ramesh Mata, Kapil Ramesh Mata, Popat Ovhal and Janhvi Pradeep Mata. Some of them are heirs of trustees of the school. The complainant added that the aforesaid accused sold the land to Abrol using the forged documents and the land was sold at Rs. 8.68 crores. However, Ahuja added that there are no records of transactions, hence he alleged that the transaction has taken place using black money. The said ⅔ undivided land was sold to Abrol on May 10, 2016. The 2 ⁄ 3 undivided land equals to an estimate of 66.66 percent of the land which is now owned by Abrol, which has been done without any stamp duty or registration charges, said Ahuja in this statement to the police.
Allegations of Land Grabbing and Fraudulent Schemes
Ahuja further alleges that the agenda of Abrol to buy the school land is to discontinue the school, and that he wants to build and develop multiplex, mall and apartments since Abrol is also a builder. An irrevocable power of Attorney has been made by Abrol under the name of his son Charanjit Singh Abrol, following which they had previously entered the school premises in 2020-21 with their bouncers and bodyguards to take over the possession of the school, in an illegal manner. Posing as managing authorities, they suspended the complainant.
In the FIR, police have added multiple criminal charges against the 11 accused, including 120B (criminal conspiracy), 406 (criminal breach of trust) 420 (cheating), 423 (dishonest or fraudulent execution of deed of transfer containing false statement of consideration), 200 (using as true such declaration knowing it to be false), 441 (criminal trespass), 464 (making a false document), 467 (forgery), 192 (fabricating false evidence) among others of the Indian Penal Code and relevant sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.
