Sachin Vaze’s Shiv Sena connection

Vaze was never an active member of the party. He took the primary membership in 2008, but never renewed it and therefore it expires automatically, said a senior party functionary

While the Opposition claims that chief minister Uddhav Thackeray was not keen on acting against Sachin Vaze, the Mumbai Police officer suspended on Monday after his arrest by the National Investigation Agency in connection with the security scare at Mukesh Ambani’s home, Antilia, the cop was never an active member of the party he joined in 2008, according to insiders.

Sachin Vaze joined the Shiv Sena in 2008. (HT File)

Vaze, a 1990-batch officer of the state cadre, was known as one of Mumbai Police’s ace sharpshooters and is said to have killed 63 persons in his career. He was suspended from the police force in 2004 in connection with the murder and destruction of evidence in the Khwaja Yunus custodial death case. He made repeated attempts to get reinstated between 2005 and 2007, but did not succeed. He resigned from the force, but that too was not accepted. The following year, in 2008, he joined the Shiv Sena.

Party insiders said his entry into the party was not surprising as Vaze and other police officers who gunned down gangsters in Mumbai were often appreciated by Sena supremo Bal Thackeray. Vaze earlier said he had joined the party with the backing of Sena leader Eknath Shinde, a leader from Thane district.

“Vaze was never an active member of the party. He took the primary membership in 2008, but never renewed it and therefore it expires automatically,” said a senior party functionary, requesting anonymity. However, Vaze never formally resigned from the party.

Vaze and other “encounter specialists” like Pradeep Sharma, Praful Bhosale, Daya Nayak, Vijay Salaskar gained prominence in the force during the Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government between 1995 and 1999. “These sharpshooters grew under the Sena government. Balasaheb appreciated these people, sometimes through his editorials, and in private as well,” another functionary said requesting anonymity.

Vaze’s reinstatement into the police force happened in June 2020, months after Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray took charge as the chief minister. The opposition BJP has been targeting the Shiv Sena over the entire episode. Sena leader Sanjay Raut has been defending the police officer by calling him a “capable” and “honest” cop. Last week, Thackeray said the Opposition was painting him out to be “Osama Bin Laden”.

The party functionaries and leaders who spoke to HT maintained the party has no link with Vaze and if he was found to be involved in any wrongdoing by the anti-terrorism squad, which was probing the case before the NIA took over, the government wouldn’t have protected him.

BJP leader and former CM Devendra Fadnavis, however, said in Pune on Sunday that the unwarranted support and trust by the state government led Vaze to think he could do anything and so he allegedly planned and executed the scare near Antilia.