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The Mumbai police crime branch on Thursday arrested Bhavesh Bhinde, the director of the advertisement agency that owned the illegal billboard that collapsed on a petrol pump in Ghatkopar on May 13, killing 16 people and injuring 74 others, reports hindustantimes.com.
The 51-year-old was arrested on Thursday evening at an Udaipur hotel, where he was staying using a fake identity card, said Lakhmi Gautam, joint commissioner of police (crime). Gautam added that the accused planned to move to another location on Friday morning.
Bhinde’s company, Ego Media Pvt Ltd, had set up the 120x120-foot advertising hoarding in Pant Nagar, Ghatkopar East, which collapsed after a short spell of unseasonal rain and gusty winds on May 13. The massive billboard fell on a busy petrol pump, trapping close to 100 people under it, 16 of whom died.
The Pant Nagar police on Monday had registered a case against Bhinde under sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 337 (causing hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others), 338 (causing grievous hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code.
Soon after the offence was registered, the local police and the crime branch formed around 10 teams to locate and apprehend Bhinde. The police visited his residence in Mulund West but found that he had already fled the city. His last mobile location was traced to Lonawala on Tuesday evening.
According to the police, Bhinde had travelled by road from Mumbai to Lonavala before coming back to Shil Phata in Thane. From there, he went to Ahmedabad by train, before boarding a bus to Udaipur. After reaching Udaipur on Wednesday evening, he checked into a hotel. The crime branch was trailing him and eventually apprehended him on Thursday evening at the hotel, said deputy commissioner of police Datta Nalawade. The police will bring Bhinde to Mumbai on Friday and produce him at a metropolitan magistrate court.
Meanwhile, Maharashtra director general of police Rashmi Shukla has launched an inquiry after Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kirit Somaiya alleged that former Government Railway Police (GRP) commissioner Quaiser Khalid had approved the proposal to grant Ego Media the contract to erect four massive billboards on the Pant Nagar plot of land, which the state government had allotted to the GRP.
GRP commissioner Ravindra Shisve has sent a report to Shukla with details about the contract, along with all relevant documents. Shukla and Shisve refused to comment.
Police officials said that Bhinde was booked in a rape case in January this year after a woman working in his office levelled the allegation against him. The Bombay high court had granted him pre-arrest bail in the case. The Mulund police had also filed a cheating case against Bhinde in 2016. Moreover, he was fined 21 times for various violations under the Mumbai Municipal Corporation Act, 1888, before 2009, said an officer of the Mulund police station. Bhinde had contested the Maharashtra assembly election as an independent candidate from the Mulund constituency in 2009.