A property developer, who was granted bail in a case of cheating, forgery and extortion in which gangster Dawood Ibrahim's sister Haseena Parkar is also an accused, on Friday moved the Bombay High Court seeking a CBI inquiry into the case.
In the petition, Sandeep Shukla made the state, city commissioner of police, Deputy Commissioner Kamlakar Jadhav, police inspector Anil Mahabole, sub-inspector Rajendra Nikam and a senior inspector of the Anti-Extortion Cell as parties.
Sandeep, along with his brother Krishnamilan Shukla, was granted bail on Thursday by a local court exactly a month after their arrest in the case.
The Shuklas, Parkar and five others were booked on a complaint filed by realtor Vinod Avlani.
According to Avlani, he along with Chandresh Shah had set up a deal between the Shuklas and builder Jayesh Shah of Ravi Group for a slum redevelopment project. Avlani deposited demand drafts of Rs one crore as advance but the deal fell through and only 70 per cent of the amount was returned while Rs 30 lakh were encashed by Shuklas.
According to Avlani's complaint, Haseena allegedly threatened to forget the remaining money and threatened to shoot him if he persisted with the demand for refund.
The Shuklas' lawyer B P Pandey on Friday alleged that Chandresh Shah, who had set up the deal between the Shuklas and Jayesh Shah, had gifted one mobile phone each to police officers Jadhav and Mahabole.
Pandey also alleged Mahabole and Nikam had demanded Rs 10 lakh from the Shuklas to settle the matter with Avlani.
The Shuklas lodged a complaint with the Anti-Corruption Bureau and Mahabole's cellphone was seized. However, Kamlakar's phone was not recovered, Pandey said.
Also, action against Mahabole and Nikam, which was to be initiated by higher police officials, was not taken, the petition said.
Pandey said his clients were arrested after Avlani filed a complaint with the police but the FIR was lodged five months after the complaint.
"We want to know why the FIR was not lodged immediately after Avlani's complaint," the advocate said.
"We want the case to be with the ACB as well as the (Anti-Extortion Cell) AEC to be probed by an unbiased central agency (Central Bureau of Investigation)," he added.