Acting on a complaint filed in the magistrate’s court at Borivali by a businessman, the Malvani police on Wednesday arrested a Pune-based advocate Jayshree Mahadi (39) and her husband Vishnu Mahadi (45), who works as an estate agent, for cheating the businessman to the tune of Rs 5 crore.According to the Malvani police, Tuljitsingh Rajput, a businessman based at Malad had got in touch with the couple in 2007 through some other estate agents and property dealers. During their meeting, Uma and her husband told Rajput that they knew the owner of a plot of cultivable land in Madh Island which Rajput was eager to purchase. The couple had claimed that the land measuring 9.30 acre was worth Rs 7.51 crore and accepted an initial amount of Rs. 3.75 crore from Rajput, the police said. “However, after the payment was made and the duo promised to get the paperwork done, Rajput got suspicious of the duo beacuse of their general behaviour. Also, the paperworks they procured did not seemed to be genuine,” said Senior Police Inspector Jaywant Hargude of the Malvani police station.However, early this year Rajput informed the Mahadis that he wasn’t interested in the deal and asked them to return him a sum of Rs. 5 crore, which had been agreed as the cancellation deal charges by both the parties. “Consequently, the Mahadis gave him a cheque of Rs 5 crore which was dishonoured. Rajput also realised that the paperwork regarding the land ownership that the due had shown him was forged. Based on this, he approached the Borivali Metropolitan Court and filed a private complaint against the Mahadis for cheating and forgery,” said Hargude.In June 2008, the magistrate directed the Malvani police to investigate the matter and after conducting due inquiry, a team of officials attached to the Malvani police station went to Pune and arrested the couple on Wednesday and brought them to Mumbai. “The due were produced in the court and were remanded to court till October 27. During the investigation, we also discovered that the land in question which the Mahadis had claimed to be able to sell is owned by a joint family and there is a dispute in court relating to its ownership. The Mahadis are not even remotely connected to the family that owns the land. We’re conducting further inquiries into the matter,” added Hargude.
