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Mumbai: Vasai-Virar housing scam could engulf 300 more buildings
Updated On: 19 August, 2023 07:11 AM IST | Mumbai | Shirish Vaktania
New hard drive unearthed by police shows conmen built many more illegal buildings in the region than previously understood; data sent to Kalina for forensic analysis
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Prashant Patil, the mastermind of the housing scam
The authorities fear more than 350 buildings in Vasai-Virar and Nalasopara could have been set up by the brains behind the house-of-cards scam as data related to dozens of illegal properties has been recovered from a two-terabyte hard disk seized from the alleged mastermind Prashant Patil and his gang. The device was found to contain more than 20,000 folders, according to sources. The cops now reckon the scale of the scam could be a whopping Rs 9,000 crore.
After the preliminary investigation into the scam was carried out, the authorities learnt that the accused had erected 55 residential societies in the area under the jurisdiction of the Vasai Virar City Municipal Corporation (VVCMC) using forged documents and sold flats to 3,500 families.
The Virar police, after scanning the hard disk, have found around 80 files pertaining to buildings that were set up by the accused with the help of forged documents and fake completion certificates (CC). As the scamsters would construct two or three buildings using a single CC and set of fake documents, the cops suspect that they are ultimately responsible for a whopping 350 illegal buildings mushrooming in Vasai and Virar.
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