Mumbai, Dec 26 (IANS): In a shocker, the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) has arrested a policeman posted at the high-security Arthur Road Central Jail (ARCJ) for allegedly helping two jailed drug accused threaten a witness, an official said here on Saturday.
The development came in an ATS (Charkop unit) case of 2015 in which it had busted an illegal drug manufacturing factory in Andheri West and seized a 155 kg of banned Mephedrone, and nabbed its owner Sajid Electricwala.
The ATS managed to arrest three others, gangster Harish Mandvikar and his henchmen, Sachin Kolekar and Sujit Padwalkar.
Mandvikar was lodged in the infamous 'Anda Cell' at ARCJ in which Electriwala has been lodged since five years.
The cop's involvement came to the fore when a prime prosecution witness informed the special NDPS court that he was being threatened by the henchmen of both Mandvikar and Electricwala.
Both Mandvikar and Electricwala are currently in ATS custoy till December 28 and the two other accused, Kolekar and Padwalkar, have been sent to judicial custody.
After the swoop on Electricwala's illegal drug manufacturing unit, the ATS had nabbed him and six others who remain in ARCJ since 2015.
In March 2020, Mandvikar was also nabbed and lodged in ARCJ next to Electricwala's cell.
The duo became friends and in court and hatched an alleged conspiracy to threaten a prime witness whose deposition is currently underway before the special court.
"As part of the conspiracy, Mandvikar sent a hand-wrtten chit from his cell to his henchman Kolekar, ordering him to intimidate and scare the prime witness, which was done by Padwalkar," said an ATS officer.
The investigations reveled that a police officer deployed outside the Anda Cell had acted as the messenger to personally pass on handwritten chits from the jailed Mandvikar to his aides outside.
"In fact, the concerned policeman had passed similar handwritten notes for several months," the official added.
The policeman was arrested on Friday and produced before a court which shunted him to ATS custody till December 28.
With this, the ATS has managed to successfully unearth the conspiracy and arrest all the culprits involved in the case. It is now trying to unravel the associates or others linked with the arrested policeman.