MUMBAI: Republic TV’s Arnab Goswami and two other businessmen delayed payment to or failed to pay interior designer Anway Naik’s firm, thus crumbling his financial position which led him to commit suicide, Alibaug police said in their chargesheet filed on Friday in the abetment to suicide case registered against Goswami and two others.
The chargesheet was filed a day after Goswami moved the Bombay high court seeking a stay on the probe and filing of the chargesheet.
The police case was based on a suicide note which stated that Naik, a 53-year-old interior designer, and his mother had decided to end their lives as payments totalling Rs 5.4 crore due to them were not being cleared by owners of three companies — ARG Outlier (that operates Republic TV), Feroz Shaikh of IcastX/Skimedia and Neetish Sarda of Smartworks.
Naik and his mother were found dead at their Alibaug farmhouse on May 5, 2018. A suicide note written in English by Naik had blamed the trio for failing to pay him his dues. Naik was the MD of Concord Design Private Ltd, a Mumbai-based architectural and interior designing firm, and his mother was on the firm’s board of directors.
The chargesheet stated that the three accused had given contract work of interior designing, civil and electrical work, plumbing and engineering consultancy for their respective offices as per the work order. “The deceased had done all the work as per the work order. The accused gave additional work which the deceased completed. Seeing the extra work it was necessary to make changes in the bill of quantity but the trio made him work extra and paid him less,” the chargesheet said.
They escalated the contract work of designing the interiors, civil and other work in their respective offices from Naik’s firm and delayed payments or failed to pay him on time, the chargesheet said.
It further stated that the deceased had brought raw material to carry out the construction and interior work in their respective companies. The three accused, in a bid to not pay the deceased, issued debit notes and they did not take Naik’s signatures on any of these debit notes, the chargesheet said.
“The accused did not pay money and kept delaying his payments. And due to all this, the clients from whom Naik had brought raw material started calling him for their money. In a bid to recover his dues, Naik kept on meeting with the three accused, mailing them, texting them and calling them requesting to pay his dues, but they delayed/failed to pay which led to mental harassment which led Naik to take (the) extreme step,” the chargesheet said.
The Alibaug police on Friday submitted the 1,914-paged chargesheet before the Alibaug district magistrate’s court against Republic TV’s Goswami, Shaikh and Sarda.
All three were arrested on November 4 and were subsequently released on bail based on a Supreme Court order. The police filed the chargesheet on the 30th day of the arrest under Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code, which pertains to abetment to suicide. The section attracts a punishment of 10 years’ imprisonment and fine. In the chargesheet, police had also added IPC Section 109 that speaks about punishment for abetment if the act abetted is committed in consequence and where no express provision is made for its punishment.
Police said there are around 65 witnesses, and a few of the key witnesses have even given statements under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code before a magistrate. These statements can be treated as evidence. Police have attached the copies of contract agreements between the deceased and the companies of the accused persons, the invoices of raw material, promissory notes, bank statements showing flow of financial transactions and exchange of emails, WhatsApp and other text messages regarding the work and payments.