Jail security up as conmen dupe Vanzara & Co

In all,15 policemen are lodged in the Sabarmati jail in this case,including key accused and suspended IPS officers DG Vanzara,Rajkumar Pandian and Dinesh MN of Rajasthan cadre.

The police have also asked the jails and prisons department to remain on alert about the officers who come from central agencies to question or meet jail inmates. The conmen had reportedly made a deal of Rs 50 lakh with the Sohrabuddin accused lodged in the central jail,promising to help them walk free in the Sohrabuddin encounter case.

The prison authorities were questioned on how did the conmen manage to enter the premises with fake CBI cards and identity proofs. The conmen had reportedly managed to get bonafide cards on their names to pose as CBI officers.

The Ahmedabad police said that since the CBI team from Mumbai is investigating the case,they are not probing into the details of the fraud but they have asked the city police to remain on alert about such conmen. They have also been asked to “learn” to verify the identity cards of state police officers and officers from Central agencies to distinguish between fake and genuine officers.

The city police have been also asked keep a watch on the absconding middleman,one Hemraj,who had helped the conmen in duping people,police added.

Sources said that after the Ahmedabad police learnt about the case,they carried out enquiries at Ahmedabad Circuit House,where the duo stayed while on visits to extort money from the Sohrabuddin accused. They also stayed briefly in Rajkot and Surat.

While Ashwini is a class X dropout,Rajesh is an MBA. Both operated from Mumbai. They stayed in Gujarat for three months often shuttling between Ahmedabad,Surat and Rajkot. Moreover,they travelled in cars with an amber-beacon cars.

They also reportedly forged chargesheets of the Sohrabuddin case,statements of witnesses and other records to dupe people. According to CBI,the duo have duped people across the country,taking advantage of the ongoing investigations of the Sohrabuddin and Tulsiram encounter cases.

State businessman tips off CBI about conman

A businessman from Ahmedabad has tipped off the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) about several top businessmen from Gujarat who might have become victims of Ashwini Kumar Sharma,who posed as a CBI officer and duped them.

The CBI in Mumbai has sent a team to Gujarat to investigate the matter.

A senior officer from CBI said the businessman,who identified himself as P Gupta from Ahmedabad,had met Ashwini Kumar in a Mumbai-bound flight from Ahmedabad a few weeks ago.

The officials added that Ashwini introduced himself as a CBI officer from Mumbai and opened a long conversation with Gupta and discussed about the money he had received from a few businessmen in Gujarat who wanted to settle some deals with the police and the government.

CBI has sent a team to Gujarat to locate possible victims of the conman.

The CBI also suspects that the absconding friend of Ashwini,Aniruddh Agarwal,may have targeted a lot of businessmen from the state.