Lawyer booked on charge of extorting ₹1.2cr from bizman

Pune: The Deccan Gymkhana police on Monday booked a prominent lawyer and his two associates after a businessman from Jalgaon lodged a complaint accusing them of extorting Rs1.22 crore from him between November 2021 and June 2022 after threatening to implicate him in an economic offence case being probed by the Pune police.The lawyer, who has represented the state in several high-profile cases, told TOI, “It is a fake and fabricated case against me. I don’t even know who the complainant is. I haven’t yet received a copy of the FIR and I will make an elaborate statement once I go through its contents.”Senior inspector Sandipan Pawar of the Deccan Gymkhana police said, “We have registered a case on the basis of the statement recorded by the complainant with us.” The police have invoked charges of criminal conspiracy, criminal intimidation, extortion, among others.The complainant’s father was among the accused arrested by the city police in the economic offence case and the lawyer was then representing the state in this matter. The complainant has alleged that the lawyer misused his official position and conspired with the two aides to get him arrested in the case in January 2021. But the Bombay high court released him on bail in May 2021. The HC had then barred him from entering Maharashtra and he was staying in Indore, he alleged.In July 2021, the Pune police issued him summons for questioning in the case. At this point, the trio started making Rs2 crore extortion demands by threatening him, the complainant alleged.He told police that he was called in Jalgaon to hand over the money, but he didn’t relent. Finally, the complainant relented and negotiated a deal for Rs1.22 crore instead of Rs2 crore and gave the money to the lawyer’s aide, he alleged in his police statement.