The Pune city police have arrested two cops in connection with the escape of drug racketeer Lalit Anil Patil from the Sassoon Hospital. The accused cops have been identified as police naiks Natharam Kale and Amit Jadhav, attached to the ‘Court company’, Pune police headquarters. With this, the number of arrests in the Lalit Patil escape case has reached eight. A resident of Nashik, Lalit Patil, 34, was lodged in Yerwada Central Prison from December 2020 following his arrest by the Pimpri Chinchwad police in connection with the seizure of 20 kilogram mephedrone worth Rs 20 crore from Chakan in October of that year. He, however, complained of medical issues on multiple occasions and managed to get himself admitted to the Sassoon Hospital for treatment. On September 30, the police arrested Lalit Patil’s aide Subhash Mandal from a spot near Sassoon Hospital with over 1.71 kilogram of mephedrone worth Rs 2.14 crore. The probe revealed that Lalit Patil, who was then admitted to ward number 16 of Sassoon Hospital for treatment of ‘hernia’, had allegedly supplied the contraband to Mandal through hospital canteen worker Rauf Shaikh. The police subsequently seized two iPhones, each worth Rs 1.1 lakh from Patil during a search at the hospital ward. An FIR was lodged against Patil, Mandal, and Shaikh under the NDPS Act. While the probe was on the mephedrone seizure case, Lalit Patil fled from the hospital around 7.40 pm on October 2. A separate offence was lodged against him for escaping custody under Sections 223, 224, 225 of the Indian Penal Code. Deputy Commissioner of Police (crime) Amol Zende confirmed that policemen Kale and Jadhav, have been arrested under IPC Section 223 (escape from custody negligently suffered by a public servant). They were on duty at the Sassoon Hospital when Lalit Patil escaped. The two cops were produced before a court in Pune Friday. The court remanded them in police custody for one day, to investigate the case further. The police said Kale and Jadhav are among the 10 cops who were suspended from service for their alleged negligence due to which Lalit Patil escaped from the hospital. The probe had revealed that after allegedly escaping from the Sassoon Hospital, Lalit Patil easily walked into a plush hotel near Pune railway station. From there, he allegedly escaped in a car. The police first arrested the car driver, Dattatraya Doke. Later, the police arrested Vinay Aranha, 50, a partner in Pune’s Rosary Education Group. The police said Doke worked as a car driver for Aranha, who was lodged in Taloja jail in Mumbai, since his arrest in March this year by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a multi-crore bank fraud case. The police have alleged that Aranha and Lalit Patil were admitted to the same ward in Sassoon Hospital for treatment. The police have claimed that after escaping, Lalit Patil used an ATM card belonging to Aranha’s manager Ashwin Kamat to withdraw money. The police also arrested Lalit Patil’s close friend and lawyer Pradnya Kamble, Archana Nikam as well as his brother Bhushan Patil and Abhishek Balkawade for their alleged role in the escape. The police alleged that Kamble, Nikam, and other accused ‘conspired’ for the last ‘two to three months’ and planned Lalit Patil’s escape from custody. The police said that after escaping, Lalit Patil had a meeting with Kamble and Nikam in Nashik on October 4 and October 5, where the women allegedly gave him Rs 25 lakh. Meanwhile, in a separate case, the Mumbai police raided the factory in Nashik last month and seized mephedrone worth Rs 300 crore and other materials. During the investigation of this case, the Mumbai police arrested Lalit Patil on October 17. The Pune police took his custody from a jail in Mumbai for probing the mephedrone seizure case. As per a court’s order, Lalit Patil is in the custody of the Pune city police till November 20. The Pune police have till now identified 14 accused in this case, including their ‘gang leader’ Arvindkumar Lohare, who is a ‘chemical expert’ from Mumbai, initially arrested along with Lalit Patil in the Chakan mephedrone seizure case. The police have invoked the stringent Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) against Lalit Patil, Lohare, and their aides for allegedly running a mephedrone cartel.
