After the orders of Bombay high court, a case involving a senior government officer and his wife in Mumbai has been transferred to the crime branch and now will be investigated by a deputy commissioner of police and supervised by the joint commissioner of police.

Recently, Bombay high court had transferred the case to the senior officials of the crime branch, considering that it involves a senior officer.

In July this year, the Versova police have booked a man who allegedly posed as an IAS officer and duped a group of people, including a Rajasthan businessman, in Mumbai to the tune of Rs 5.77 crore.

The accused lured the victims into investing money in various Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA) projects in Mumbai and offered double returns. The accused has been identified as Ashutosh Kumar Sahay and his wife as Monika.

The couple had allegedly cheated the victims by promising to double their investments in a slum rehabilitation (SRA) project.

The high court said, “We are completely satisfied with the way the investigation officer has conducted the investigation in the present matter. However, because applicant no. 1 (IAS officer Ashutosh Sahay) is stated to be an IAS officer, we feel that the present investigating officer may have his own limitations. As such, we direct the investigations to be conducted by DCP and to be supervised by JCP of the said department. The DCP may take the help of the present investigating officer.”

Mr. Ramkumar Dadhich, a businessman from Kota, Rajasthan, filed a complaint in July this year. He alleged that Sahay and his wife Monica and their partners Manoj Patil and Sanjay Pandey, lured him and some of his friends to invest in SRA projects. The IAS officer claimed he would use his connections in the government to help them double their investment.

Police said he showed some fake documents of land in Bhandup and Kanjurmarg and collected Rs 1.50 crore from Dadich and Rs 4.27 crore from his friends. Sahay told Dadhich that he had land in the Kanjurmarg-Bhandup area and won his trust by showing the ownership documents, valuation certificate and undertaking of that land and got Dadhich to invest money in his projects.

Ashutosh Sahay is a Central government Group ‘A’ services cadre 1992 batch officer who has done his B.Tech (Textiles) and MBA in International Marketing. He has also done PGDM (Business Management) and PGDM (Human Resource Management). He also holds an LLB degree. He has experience of 29 years working with various government departments.