Kandivali police catch fraudster’s accomplice

The police said that the accused pretended to be a gold jewellery businessman from Bangalore, and claimed to own a showroom with 30-40 people working for him. By regularly providing the victim information and photos about jewelery orders, he convinced her that he was a big jewellery merchant, the police added

Mumbai: The Kandivali police on Saturday arrested the accomplice of a man who had defrauded a woman by stealing her gold ornaments worth around ₹20 lakh under the pretext of borrowing them to copy their designs.

Gold jewellery is displayed in a shop in Kathmandu.

The main accused, Bhautik Ramesh Shah, was arrested in January and a chargesheet was filed against him in a local court. The second accused, Rajeshwari Chimlal Soni, 40, from Gujarat, was on the police’s wanted list for his alleged involvement in the jewellery fraud case.

According to the police the victim is a 40-year-old woman from Kandivali who lives with her husband, a business man who works in Grant Road. She met Shah in 2024 through a social networking site, and soon afterwards, he asked her to marry him, a proposal that she promptly declined.

The police said that the accused pretended to be a gold jewellery businessman from Bangalore, and claimed to own a showroom with 30-40 people working for him. By regularly providing the victim information and photos about jewelery orders, he convinced her that he was a big jewellery merchant, the police added.

The police said that the accused asked the victim to give him some of her jewellery so that he could copy the designs and then give her a commission for them. In August 2024, he came to Mumbai, met the victim in a hotel in Mira Road. According to the police, the victim gave him her gold jewellery worth ₹20 lakh, and he promised to copy them using a machine and then return them to her.

When Shah did not return the jewellery by the time he had promised, the victim began enquiring about it. The police said that he told her he had given the jewellery to the second accused, Soni, and she would have to pay ₹1 lakh to retrieve it. When she sent him the money, he kept both the money and the jewellery, and began dodging her calls.

According to the police, the woman soon realised she had been cheated and filed a complaint with the police in January. The police then registered a case against Shah for misappropriation and fraud, and arrested him. During his interrogation, he revealed the involvement of Soni.

On Saturday, Soni was produced before the court where he was sent to police custody. The police said, “We have arrested Shah’s accomplice and are still trying to recover the stolen gold and the money.”