Gawli's judicial custody extended till Aug 12

Mumbai, Jul 21: MCOCA court here today extended the judicial custody of gangster-turned-politician Arun Gawli and others, held in an extortion and murder case, to August 12.

Besides Gawli, the list of accused include Vijay Ahir, Dinesh Narkar, Sudheer Ghorpade, Ajit Rane, Sanjay Kamble, Shrikrishna Ghurav alias Babu, and Mohammed Shafi Qureshi, Dinesh Narkar, Srikrishna Gurav alias Babu, Vijay Kumar Giri, Narendra Giri, Anil Giri, Ashok Jaiswal, Sahebrao Bhintude, Sadashiv Surve, Surendra Panchal and Sandeep Dongan.

Police had arrested Gawli on April 21 for extorting money from a city builder. Gawli and others have been arrested for the same offence during the period from October 2005 till May 2006.

The builder was allegedly brought to Dagdi Chawl, where Gawli resides, and was asked to pay up around Rs 50 lakh. The builder paid the money in two installments.

Later, when the builder bagged a new project in Prabhadevi in November 2006, he again started receiving extortion calls and was again asked to visit Dagdi Chawl. The builder then lodged a complaint with the police in this regard.

During the interrogation of the co-accused it came into light that Gawli was allegedly involved in conspiracy to eliminate Shiv Sena Corporator Kamlakar Jamsandekar and then he along with others were booked in this case as well.

UNI