Ahmed Ali (THE TIMES OF INDIA; August 28, 2020)

Mumbai: Forced to shut down his tea stall in Dharavi and return to his hometown in Khed post Coronavirus lockdown, a 34-year-old graduate landed up behind bars for allegedly impersonating as a henchman of convicted gangster Abu Salem and demanding Rs 34 crore from filmmaker-actor Mahesh Manjrekar.

On Thursday, the anti-extortion cell (AEC) of Mumbai Police arrested Milind Tulsankar from his village and booked him under the relevant IPC sections for impersonation, issuing threats and extortion bid. He was produced in court which sent him in police custody till September 2.

Revealing his plan to the cops, Tulsankar said that he knew that he would not get Rs 34 crore, but was hopeful to get a few lakhs that would help his support his family of seven for some time. He also said that he had planned to use hawala channels to receive the extortion money.

Manjrekar, on Wednesday, lodged a complaint with Dadar police that he has been getting threat messages on his phone since a week. “The sender claimed that he was a member of the Abu Salem gang, demanded Rs 34 crore from Manjrekar and threatened him with dire consequences if he did not pay up,” said investigating officer Sachin Kadam of AEC. Salem is currently serving life sentence in Taloja jail after being convicted in the 1993 serial blasts case as well as builder Pradeep Jain murder case.

As it was an extortion case with suspected underworld links, it was transferred to the AEC. The police officers, with the help of a mobile service provider, traced the sender of the messages to Khed and nabbed Tulsankar.

“During interrogation, Tulsankar said he decided to take to crime as he had run out of his savings,” said senior inspector Ajay Sawant. “The accused said that during an online search, he stumbled upon a news report on how Salem would issue extortion threats to his victims in the late 90s. He decided to use the same modus operandi and selected Manjrekar as his victim. He said that he got the filmmaker’s phone number from a web portal that provides criminal and financial background information on candidates contesting elections and sent him four to five threat messages demanding Rs 34 crore.”

Manjrekar, who has directed critically acclaimed films like Vaastav: The Reality, Astitva and Viruddh and even acted in films, had contested the 2014 Lok Sabha election from North Mumbai on an MNS ticket. He, however, lost to Shiv Sena’s Gajanand Kirtikar.