Vaze ran extortion racket from a five-star hotel room, says NIA

Sachin Vaze, the Mumbai police officer arrested in connection with the Ambani security scare case, was running his alleged extortion racket from a five-star hotel at Nariman Point, reports said quoting officials of the National Investigation Agency.

The agency said Vaze had used a forged Aadhaar card and a fictitious name to check into room number 1964 of the hotel.

"A businessman had booked this hotel for 100 days and for ₹ 12 lakh. Vaze was helping this businessman in some dispute," a senior NIA officer was quoted as saying by NDTV.

The officer told the TV channel that the booking was done through a travel agent and that Vaze had stayed there in February while reporting for duty at the Crime Branch.

Meanwhile, the NIA conducted searches at a hotel and a club in south Mumbai and a flat in neighbouring Thane on Thursday and also detained a woman, PTI reported.

An NIA team, which is probing the recovery of an explosives-laden Scorpio near industrialist Mukesh Ambani's residence and the murder of businessman Mansukh Hiran, reached the Soni building, where the hotel and the club are situated, around 12.45 pm. The probe team left the place after over three hours.

According to sources, the flat was in a woman's possession and was locked for over two weeks, and the same woman, an alleged associate of Vaze, was detained by the agency from the airport on Thursday evening, the PTI said. However, NIA has not officially confirmed this.

The NIA on Sunday recovered a laptop, a printer, two hard disks, two vehicle number plates, two digital video recorders (DVRs) and two CPUs from the Mithi river with the help of divers.

The probe agencies so far have seized seven high-end cars used by Vaze—the Scorpio found near Ambani's residence, two Mercedes cars, a Prado Land Cruiser, a Mitsubishi Outlander, a Volvo, and an Innova.