Mumbai college admission scam: Four held for cheating Chembur man of Rs 6L

Sion police have apprehended four people for conning a Chembur resident of nearly Rs 6 lakh after promising to get the victim's son's admitted to a medical college.

According to police sources, the victim, Lalji Patwa, met the main accused, Ali Raza Abdul Kalim Sheikh, when the former was serving as a witness to an extortion case in 2016. Incidentally, Sheikh was one of the accused in that case. "Sheikh befriended Patwa before going to jail and promised to work for him after he had served his term behind the bars. A few months later, Sheikh got in touch with Patwa," said a Sion police officer.

Patwa, who works as a tailor at a garment factory, was trying to get his 18-year-old son, Rahul, admitted to medical college during that time. On being told about this, Sheikh assured Patwa that he could get Rahul admitted to a medical school in a few weeks.

In August last year, Sheikh sought Rs 5.36 lakh from Patwa as admission fees sought by a medical college. Patwa said. "I mortgaged my life insurance policy for R6 lakh and gave a demand draft to Sheikh, but he insisted on cash. He gave me a receipt later and said the adm­ission was done. But the college denied admitting Rahul. We called Sheikh, but he demanding more money."

Patwa gave R45,000 more to Sheikh, but Rahul still did not get a seat in the college. "This went on for months. Rahul, who was missing all the classes, went to the college with the receipts only to be told that those were all fake. In May, Sheikh threatened to assault me and Rahul if we kept bothering him. I filed a case with the Sion police on May 19," he said.

Yesterday, the cops identified four people involved in the case and arrested Sheikh "We had received similar complaints from other parents. Sheikh is a history sheeter who was previously booked over land scams," a Sion police officer said.