Pune drug-lord, 3 others' police custody extended till Oct 27

Mumbai, Oct 23 (IANS) A Mumbai court has extended the police custody of the Pune-based arrested drug-lord Lalit Patil and three of his associates till October 27, officials said here on Monday. 

After the first remand ended, Patil was produced before the court of Andheri Magistrate's Court of Vijay C. Gawai who extended his police custody till Friday. 

Besides him, the custody of Sachin Wagh, Rohit Chaudhary, and Shivaji Shinde was extended till October 27. 

Arguing for extending their police remand, the police prosecutors said that a large cache of narcotics was seized during the case investigations, and Wagh had admitted to disposing off large stocks of Mephedrone drugs on instructions of Patil. 

However, the police have to ascertain whether Wagh actually disposed off the narcotics or has hidden them somewhere. 

The prosecutors said that Patil’s brother Bhushan Patil who was also involved in the illegal drugs business, is among the 15 accused arrested so far in the case. The police want to interrogate the two brothers on various aspects like who was the owner of the drug factory running in MIDC Nashik which was leased out to some other person but run by Bhushan Patil, and was getting rent through Gpay and PhonePe. 

Patil, who had "escaped" from the clutches of Pune police on October 2 when he was in the Sassoon Hospital, was arrested by a team of Mumbai Police from near Chennai. He was brought to Mumbai on October 17 after which he was sent to 5 days police custody.

A team of Pune police is also in Mumbai to seek his custody for cases filed against Patil in the same case in Pune, even as a major political row erupted in the state between the ruling MahaYuti government and the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi leaders. 

--IANS

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