Seven booked under anti-Black Magic Act for extorting ₹78L from woman

Seven people were booked for cheating a woman in Navi Mumbai of gold and cash worth ₹78 lakhs under the pretext of performing black magic and rituals. The woman's family found a diary detailing the rituals performed and places visited. The accused promised to keep the woman's husband safe and dig up a hidden treasure.

Navi Mumbai: Seven persons were booked on Thursday for allegedly performing black magic and cheating a woman from Vashi of ₹42 lakh gold and ₹36 lakh cash under the pretext of keeping her husband safe and asking money for performing different rituals. The accused also promised to dig up a treasure hidden underground.

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The incident came to light when the 56-year-old woman got a paralytic attack, after which her family found a diary in which she had written the various rituals they performed and different places they visited for the rituals.

According to the complaint lodged by Sanjay Pawar, 62, on Thursday, the accused men, including a ‘guru’ had cheated his wife on the pretext of ‘raining’ money and extracting treasure from underground. The accused men had also predicted that her husband was in danger, and to keep him safe, some rituals had to be performed.

Pawar is a retired government official and is currently living in Vashi with his wife Nayan Lakshmi.

Pawar used to frequently travel to Ratnagiri and has been staying there for extended periods for the last eight months due to their house being constructed.

During that time, Lakshmi got in touch with a ‘guru’ and got involved in black magic.

Last month, his wife got a brain stroke and was under treatment. During that period, their daughter who lives in Kamothe visited their Vashi flat and found a black doll and lemons pierced with needles in her house. She also found items related to black magic in the house. The daughter also found a diary in which her mother had written the details of the rituals performed and at which places.

According to Pawar, she had mentioned the names of Nilesh Hatwalane alias ‘Guruji’ and his wife Archana Hatwalane, Sagar Jejurkar, Vijay Babel, Nana Bhau, Bhakti, and Anusaya Kamble.

Lakshmi was allegedly taken to various river sides and temples in Gujarat, Ahmedabad, Nadol, Ashapura, Madhya Pradesh, Sangamner, Sakur, Savargaon, Khandoba, Ratnagiri, Guhagar, Uran, Ahmednagar, and other areas of Maharashtra on the pretext of performing puja and for every ritual, they took money and gold from her.

After preliminary investigations, the Vashi Police registered a case under section 3, 2(1) of The Maharashtra Prevention and Eradication of Human Sacrifice and other Inhuman, Evil and Aghori Practices and Black Magic Act, 2013, sections 420 (cheating), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 34 (common intention) against the accused persons. “When we met the lady, she claims that whatever she wrote in the diary was her imagination. She is semi-paralysed and can’t talk much. The complainant, who is her husband, claims otherwise. Since both the statements are contradictory, we would be verifying the facts by tracing the mobile phone locations,” Sanjay Nale, police inspector, Vashi police station, said.

“The woman had met ‘guruji’ and others in one of the poojas and they know each other. All the accused are from Kamothe.”