Mumbai: The anti-extortion cell of the Mumbai police has arrested Rizwan Iqbal Ibrahim Kaskar (30), the nephew of underworld don Dawood Ibrahim and son of his brother Iqbal Kaskar, from the Mumbai international airport in an extortion case.
Rizwan’s father, Iqbal, was arrested in connection with an extortion case last year and is lodged in Thane jail.
The police arrested Rizwan at 11.30 pm on Wednesday and another accused, Ashfaque Towelwalla (34), at 1.30 pm the following day. They were then produced before the Esplanade court in the city, which remanded them in police custody till Monday. Before these two, the police had already arrested Ahmed Raza Afroz Wagharia (24), who was remanded in police custody till July 22.
The arrests were made following a complaint registered at the Pydhonie police station under Section 387 (putting a person in fear of death or of grievous hurt, in order to commit extortion) and Section 120 B (criminal conspiracy) of Indian Penal Code.
According to the complaint, Towelwalla and the complainant were business partners three years ago and used to import electronic articles from Dubai and China, which they would sell in India. The police in its remand application stated that Towelwalla owed '15.5 lakh to the complainant, but he didn’t return the money despite the latter’s repeated demands.
On June 12, the complainant received a phone call from a foreign number and the caller told him he was Fahim Machmach, a Dawood gang-member, who was calling from Chhota Shakeel’s side. The caller then allegedly told him not to demand his money back from Wagharia or Towelwalla.
The next day, Wagharia also contacted complainant via a WhatsApp call and told him that if did not follow Machmach’s instructions he would lose his life. After receiving several other threatening calls, the complainant filed a police complaint, following which Wagharia was arrested from the Mumbai airport when he was deported from Dubai a couple of days ago and it was during his interrogation when Rizwan’s name cropped up.
Terming the matter a civil dispute, Rizwan’s lawyer Vishal Ingawale has opposed the remand application, saying the complainant should have gone to court with whatever grievance he has against his business partner and Rizwan’s name was being unnecessarily dragged into the matter.
According to Mr Ingawale, Rizwan frequently visits Dubai for business purposes and the police’s claim that he was escaping from India was absolutely wrong.
He also contended that the allegation against Rizwan is that he arranged a telephonic conversation between Machmach and the complainant and his police custody was not required to prove this. However, the magistrate remanded him in police custody.
