THE CRIME branch of Mumbai police arrested the former director of the Ego Media company, whose hoarding had collapsed on a petrol pump in Ghatkopar, killing 17 persons on May 13. Along with Jahnvi Marathe, her aide Sagar Patil, who oversaw the setting up of the hoarding, too was arrested from a hotel in Goa where they were holed up for the past few weeks. Ever since the hoarding had collapsed, Marathe was missing and had her anticipatory bail plea rejected as well. An officer said, “Marathe and Patil have been arrested from a hotel in Goa. They are being brought to the city by flight.” An officer said they had been on the lookout for the duo for the past few weeks as their phones had been switched off. Marathe was the director of the company till November 2023, following which Bhavesh Bhinde, an arrested accused in the case, became the director. Police said that Bhinde had registered the company in her name as he had been blacklisted earlier. However, after the duo had a fall-out, he became the director again in December 2023. The accused would keep their mobile phone switched off and would travel 12 km to make a phone call after which they would switch it off again which made it difficult to track them down. While the police team was aware they were in Goa, the teams were finding it difficult to zero in on their location. Following this, two more teams were put into the search and eventually, the duo was found on Saturday evening. They will be produced before the court on Sunday, an officer said. With the two arrests, the total number of arrests in the case has gone up to four. The two arrested earlier include Bhavesh Bhinde, the current owner of Ego Media company and Manoj Sanghu, the BMC approved structural engineer who gave a safety certificate for the hoarding. Both the accused are currently in judicial custody. An officer said that as per records, Marathe was the director of the company when the permission was acquired for the particular hoarding from the Government Railway Police (GRP). The hoarding was set up when she was at the helm and it was Patil who oversaw the setting up of the hoarding, making him culpable as well. The police recently got a report from the VJTI which said that the foundation of the structure was not strong enough and its capacity to withstand winds was only one-third of the required capacity. So far, the police probe has revealed that the permission for the particular 140X120 feet hoarding was given by the then GRP Commissioner after his transfer order had been issued by the government. No tenders had been called for the particular hoarding as well. The police have also found that the GRP misled the BMC by telling them that the civic body’s permission was not needed as it was railway land. Railway officials recently told the Mumbai Police SIT that the land does not belong to them. The police have found that the land belongs to the state government and BMC permission should have been taken in the matter. The SIT is in the process of recording the statements of GRP and BMC officials to see if they were hand-in-glove with the accused.
