Woman friend's passport-immigration woes land man in 'pati, patni aur woh' soup with Mumbai cops
A 46-year-old Pune-based businessman who went missing from Mumbai's international airport and triggered a kidnapping FIR after his wife reported him missing had allegedly fabricated a story about immigration problems to conceal a trip to Kuala Lumpur with a woman friend, police said on Friday.
The man, who runs a laundry business, had planned to travel to the Malaysian capital on September 14 with his woman friend. However, their travel plans were disrupted after immigration officials allegedly found that the woman was carrying an old passport that she had previously reported as lost, according to a Sahar police official.
The development reportedly created a legal issue for the woman and left the businessman concerned that his wife would discover that he was travelling with another woman. His wife had been told that the trip was strictly for business purposes, the official said.
“After his woman friend was stopped by the immigration department, the businessman cancelled his journey, switched off his mobile phone, and went to Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT), Central Railway's main station in south Mumbai, with her,” the police official said.
Before leaving the airport, the man allegedly called his wife from a landline and told her that he had been required to surrender his mobile phone because of an immigration-related issue.
The following day, he reportedly contacted his wife through a brief WhatsApp video call and repeated the explanation. His phone subsequently became unreachable.
Concerned about his whereabouts, his wife approached the police on Wednesday, following which a kidnapping case was registered based on her complaint.
Later on Wednesday night, the businessman reportedly went to Sahar police station, which has jurisdiction over Mumbai's international airport, after learning that an FIR had been registered.
During questioning, he allegedly admitted that the story about being forced to surrender his phone over an immigration issue had been fabricated.
Police said the case was the result of a genuine misunderstanding rather than an actual kidnapping.
The police official said investigators would submit a ‘C Summary’ closure report to the court within two weeks. Such a classification is used when a case has been registered because of a genuine mistake of fact or when the allegations are found to be neither completely true nor completely false.
with inputs from PTI
