Pune police detain Kiran Gosavi, NCB’s controversial ‘independent witness’ in cruise drugs case

@the_news_21

Pune: The Pune police on Thursday said they have detained Kiran Gosavi, the controversial witness and a self-styled private investigator of Mumbai, in the cruise drugs bust case, in connection with a cheating case lodged in 2018. 

“We have taken him into custody from the outskirts of Pune. Our case is regarding a cheating case in which Gosavi was absconding. He had promised jobs to some people and a charge sheet was filed in this regard. As per the record, he was ‘missing’ in this case for two years. We are completing the pre-arrest procedures,” said Pune Commissioner of Police Amitabh Gupta. 

According to sources, a team of policemen from the anti-extortion cell of the Pune Crime Branch took Kiran Gosavi into custody from the city’s Katraj area at around 4 a.m. It may be recalled that Gosavi had earlier said he wanted to surrender before the Uttar Pradesh Police as he apparently felt “threatened” in Maharashtra.  

However, on Wednesday, he travelled to Pune and had even told a news channel that he would be appearing before Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) authorities   who are conducting an internal inquiry against its Mumbai zonal director Sameer Wankhede in Mumbai.

Gosavi had stated that following his Mumbai appearance before the NCB, he planned to surrender to the Pune Police. Sources in the city Police’s Crime Branch said that they detained him today morning before he could travel to Mumbai. 

The Pune city police had kept Gosavi under surveillance and were reportedly tracking a dozen possible locations as to where the absconder might be. A look out circular (LOC) against him had been issued by the Pune police on October 13 in order to prevent Gosavi fleeing the country. 

The shadowy ‘private investigator’, who was in the news recently after his selfie with Aryan Khan – the son of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan – went viral on social media and questions were raised about his conduct during the drug bust of October 2, had reportedly gone missing ever since the incident.  

While questions were raised about Gosavi’s controversial involvement in the NCB raid, it transpired a First Information Report (FIR) had been lodged against him in connection with a cheating case by one Chinmay Deshmukh, a resident of the city’s Kasba Peth area at the Faraskhana police station on May 29, 2018. 

As per the FIR, Gosavi had posted an advertisement about hotel management jobs on social media platforms and Deshmukh got in touch with him. Gosavi had allegedly promised the latter a job in Malaysia and had asked him to transfer a sum of Rs. 3.09 lakh to his bank account between November 2017 and March 2018. 

After neither getting the job or his money back, a frustrated Deshmukh lodged a police complaint after which a case under Sections 419 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and relevant sections of the Information and Technology Act were lodged against Gosavi. 

Gosavi has also been named as an accused in three more cheating cases, including one in Mumbai in 2007 and two in Thane in 2015 and 2016.