Minister’s ex-PA, cop held for Ghatkopar jeweller’s murder

MUMBAI: A state minister’s former personal assistant and a suspended constable were on Saturday arrested for the murder of Ghatkopar diamond merchant Rajeshwar Udani (57), who was reported missing from November 27 and whose body was found in Panvel a week later.

The Pant Nagar police investigating the murder of diamond merchant Rajeshwar Udani (57), are trying to ascertain if actress Devoleena Bhattacharjee, girlfriend of the main arrested suspect Sachin Pawar, was aware of the plot. Late on Saturday, police were questioning her.




For, police are investigating two motives: While Udani constantly humiliated Sachin for his failure to repay a loan of Rs 3.5 lakh, Sachin was angry at the businessman’s interest in his girlfriend. “We believe money was not the primary reason,” a senior police officer said. On the role of the bar girl used to “honeytrap” Udani, police said that they are probing if she too knew about the murder plot.

During the course of investigation it was transpired that Sachin as well as Devoleena were among the last few people who had spoken to Udani. Sachin, who was senior BJP minister Prakash Mehta’s assistant between 2004 and 2009 was picked up on Friday from a hotel in Guwahati where he was with Devoleena.

On Saturday, the minister issued a statement that he had no ties with Sachin. “He used to work with me as an assistant from 2004 to 2009... I haven’t spoken to him in the past nine years,” the minister said.

During Sachin’s interrogation, police came to know about Dinesh’s role in the murder. Police sources say Sachin used to visit Dinesh’s gym. On Saturday, Sachin and Dinesh were booked for murder.

Incidentally, Dinesh had been been arrested on Friday night in a rape case. Dinesh used to run a gym called STG Gym in Ghatkopar where an employee had lodged a complaint of rape. “He had made false promises of marriage to the staffer,” an officer said.

On November 27, Udani left home and at 8.30 pm, he reached Vikhroli on Eastern Express Highway where he spoke to someone and another car arrived a few minutes later. Police believe the bar girl was in the car and they travelled for a distance before she alighted. “Then Dinesh and two others got into the car,’’ the officer said. Police have found CCTV footage of the Airoli-Mulund toll naka, the route taken by the car. The postmortem report showed strangulation marks, police sources said.