In an explosive letter to the National Investigation Agency, suspended Mumbai Police officer Sachin Vaze accused Maharashtra minister Anil Parab and former minister Anil Deshmukh of extortion.
In his hand-written letter, Vaze also claimed that NCP chief Sharad Pawar was against his reinstatement into Mumbai Police in 2020 and wanted to get it revoked.
"The home minister (Deshmukh) told me that he will convince Pawar saheb and for that purpose, he asked me to pay Rs 2 crore. I had expressed my inability to pay such an amount. On this the home minister asked me to pay it in a later course," Vaze wrote in his letter.
Vaze said in October 2020, Deshmukh called him to the Sahyadri Guest House and asked him to collect money from 1,650 bars and restaurants in Mumbai. Earlier, former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh, too, had raised a similar allegation against Deshmukh in a letter to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.
Vaze said Deshmukh raised the same demand again in January 2021 when they met at the minister's official residence.
“The home minister told me that there are approx 1,650 bars and restaurants in Mumbai and told me to collect Rs 3 to 3.5 lakh from each of these for him,” he said.
In another shocking allegation, Vaze claimed that in the month of July/August 2020, Transport minister Anil Parab called him to his official bungalow. Parab told Vaze to look into the SBUT inquiry, which was in its priliminary stage, and bring the trustees of SBUT to him for a ‘negotiation’ on the inquiry.
“He (Parab) also insisted to initiate primary talks to get Rs 50 crores from SBUT in order to close the said enquiry. I had expressed my inability to do any such thing as I do not know anybody from SBUT and also I did not have any control over the inquiry,"Vaze said in his letter.
