Conman Kiran Patel remanded police custody till April 15 by Ahmedabad court

A court in Gujarat’s Ahmedabad on Saturday granted police remand till April 15 for alleged conman Kiran Patel in a recent case of fraud in the city.

Patel was arrested by the Ahmedabad crime branch on Saturday after he was brought to Ahmedabad from Jammu and Kashmir and sought his remand for 14 days, officials said.

Patel, arrested in Jammu and Kashmir for posing as a senior official of the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) last month, was handed over to the Gujarat police on Thursday. The Gujarat police had sought his custody in a fresh case of fraud, which was granted by the court of the chief judicial magistrate in Srinagar.

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Patel was produced before a court by the Ahmedabad crime branch officials on Saturday. The crime branch recently booked Patel and his wife based on a complaint by a resident of the city who accused the duo of cheating on the pretext of renovating his bungalow.

“We have sought 14 days of police remand for Kiran Patel. The matter is being heard in the court presently,” said Ahmedabad crime branch DCP Chaitanya Mandlik.

The couple has been booked under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 406 (criminal breach of trust), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 170 (personating a public servant) and 120 B (criminal conspiracy).

According to a first information report (FIR) filed on March 22 at the Detection of Crime Branch police station in Ahmedabad, Chavda, who had put up his bungalow in the city’s Shilaj area for sale, was approached by Kiran Patel and his wife in February last year. Patel won Chavda’s trust by claiming that he worked at the PMO and that he was also the co-owner of a popular cafe joint in Ahmedabad. He also claimed that he was into renovation and building construction and promised to get his house renovated and help him sell it at a handsome price. For this, Patel took ₹35 lakh from Chavda in instalments.

When the renovation work was on, Chavda had to go to his native Junagadh for some social work. Upon his return, he was shocked to find that Patel had already put his own name plate on the bungalow and even carried out a “vastu puja” or a house-warming ceremony.

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Confronted by Chavda, he vacated the bungalow and promised him to return the ₹35 lakh when he gets paid for a few projects he had bagged from a corporate house. However, in August last year, Chavda learnt through a notice from the Ahmedabad district court that Patel had filed a civil suit claiming ownership of the property.

Chavda happens to be the brother of Congress turncoat Jawahar Chavda, who had quit the party to join the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and was made a minister in the previous government led by chief minister Vijay Rupani.

Patel, who is wanted in at least four cases in Gujarat, was arrested by police from a five-star hotel in Srinagar last month for allegedly posing as an ‘additional secretary’ in the central government , enjoying security cover, besides other hospitality.

Patel had claimed to have been given a mandate by the government to identify buyers for apple orchards in south Kashmir.