Ghatkopar hoarding collapse case: Cops add Prevention of Corruption Act sections to probe graft

Mumbai, Nov 17 (PTI) Mumbai police have added Prevention of Corruption Act sections in the 2024 Ghatkopar hoarding collapse case to probe alleged financial irregularities linked to granting of permissions for the ill-fated structure, an official said on Monday.

Seventeen persons were killed on May 13 last year when an illegal hoarding collapsed near a petrol pump in Chhedanagar area of Ghatkopar.

The police's Special Investigation Team (SIT) had written to the government few months ago citing corruption in the case that should be investigated by the Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB), the official said.

In its reply, the state government asked police to add relevant sections of Prevention of Corruption Act to avoid duplication as the witnesses and few of the suspected accused persons in the case were same, he said.

Accordingly, Mumbai police has added PCA sections in the case, the official informed.

The probe has found that advertising firm Ego Media Private Limited, which put up the hoarding, had made payments of Rs 82 lakh in various bank accounts of persons linked to one Arshad Khan, who is a business associate of the wife of IPS officer and then railway police commissioner Quaiser Khalid, the official said.

"There were 22 transactions from the bank accounts of Ego Media Private Limited and most of them were during the period when Khalid was railway police commissioner," he added.

Police had filed a 3200-page chargesheet in the case last year. Police had recorded the statement of Khalid.

In his statement, Khalid had told police officials that he knew Arshad Khan.

The IPS officer was suspended by the Maharashtra government for alleged administrative lapses and irregularities in sanctioning the Ghatkopar hoarding on his own without approval from the office of the Director General of Police.

The state government also set up a high level committee under retired Justice Dilip Bhosale.

The committee's report and recommendations were accepted in September this year.

It had recommended limiting the size of billboards to a maximum of 40x40 feet and prohibiting their installation on terrace and compound walls. PTI DC BNM