Thane Nagar police register extortion case against 3 for demanding ₹50L from TMC contractor

Following a court order, the Thane Nagar police registered an extortion case against Sonu Jalan, Ketan Tanna and Jay Tanna for demanding ₹50 lakh from a complainant who is a Thane Municipal Corporation contractor

Following a court order, the Thane Nagar police registered an extortion case against Sonu Jalan, Ketan Tanna and Jay Tanna for demanding ₹50 lakh from a complainant who is a Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) contractor.

Thane Nagar police registered an extortion case against 3 for demanding ₹50L from TMC contractor. (HT FILE PHOTO)

The accused had filed a case in 2021 against former Mumbai CP Parambir Singh and 27 others including several police officials for extorting ₹5Cr from them. The three had demanded money from this TMC contractor to keep his name out of this case.

Two different FIRs were filed, one by Sonu Jalan and another by Jay Tanna, son of Ketan. In 2019, Jay filed a complaint that his father was falsely implicated in the Arms Act. Here, he did not mention the complainant, Vikas Dabhade, 40, as extorting money. Later, in 2021, when Ketan and Sonu filed an extortion case against Singh and several police officials, Dabhade’s name was mentioned, claiming he demanded ₹50 lakh as extortion money.

Dabhade filed an application in the court regarding the discrepancies in the two FIRs and claimed that he was falsely accused when he refused to settle with the three. Therefore, on Tuesday, the court ordered Thane Nagar police to file a case against the accused and investigate the matter.

An officer from Thane Nagar police station said, “As per the complainant, the accused were booked under MCOCA Act by Thane Police in 2018 and to make the investigation in their favour, the accused approached Dabhade, who was on good terms with PI Rajkumar Kothmire, who was attached to the extortion department. They asked him to fix a meeting with Kothmire to solve the matter but Dabhade denied. The complainant claimed that this angered the three and when they were filing an extortion case against other police officials in 2021, they contacted Dabhade and demanded ₹50 lakh to leave his name out of the case. Dabhade refused. So, they falsely implicated him.”

Thane Nagar police have registered a case against the three accused under sections of extortion and an investigation about the same is going on.

Sonu Jalan was, in 2018, arrested in a cricket betting case by former cop and encounter specialist, Pradip Sharma. Jalan was out on bail when, with Ketan Tana and Munir Khan, he filed a case against former CP Parambir Singh and his team of cops including more than 27 accused of falsely implicating him in the case for not paying them extortion money in crores of rupees to them.