MUMBAI: The mystery woman seen on CCTV cameras with now-dismissed assistant police inspector Sachin Waze leaving a five-star hotel in south Mumbai before the controversy over the car explosives case broke out is a 36-yearold single mother who met the cop (then suspended), “a client”, in 2011 through a broker at a five-star hotel when she was working as an “escort”.
The woman’s statement is part of NIA’s chargesheet against 10 accused, including Waze, who are in custody for planting explosives in an SUV near industrialist Mukesh Ambani’s residence and subsequently murdering vehicle owner Mansukh Hiran.
The woman said she could not remember clearly if Waze had first introduced himself as “Sanjay or Sunil” from Pune. She said after meeting regularly for 2-3 months, he revealed his identity.
The woman was seen entering Oberoi Hotel on February 18 and leaving the following morning. She said she went to meet and stay with Waze at the hotel on two occasions in February as he had given her Rs 40 lakh and Rs 36 lakh to sort out and count. The woman said Rs 40 lakh was first given to her by Waze when he called her to the fourth floor of the police commissioner’s office on February 15 or 16. She had taken the money to her Mira Road home by local train. Waze instructed her to count the money, remove old notes and segregate notes with the serial number “786”. She said when leaving the hotel on February 19, he gave her another bag containing Rs 36 lakh which she returned on February 20 at the same hotel.
She said that after Waze was reinstated in June 2020, he told her to stop working as an escort as he would now get a “decent income”. He paid her Rs 50,000 for monthly expenses from August 2020. “We used to meet in hotels in South Mumbai where he would give me money for my expenses,” she said.
The woman claimed her unemployed and abusive husband forced her to become an escort in 2008, when her son was a couple of months old, and she separated from him in 2013. She said Waze told her he found her different from others as she did not smoke, drink or take drugs. “After a meeting, he kept calling me and wanted to meet me again. The next meeting was after 2-3 days, when he revealed his real name as Sachin and said he is a businessman,” she told NIA.
The woman had also operated a bank locker they jointly used and removed Rs 5 lakh on March 18, a few days after Waze’s arrest. The woman said she gave the money to her brother and asked him to use it to get a good lawyer and secure her bail if her name cropped up in the case. She said she left for her hometown with her son on March 31 but returned the next day after her brother informed her NIA was looking for her.
NIA also allegedly found Rs 1.5 crore in one of the accounts of a company, Mayank Automation, in which Waze had made her a proprietor in 2016. She said it was Waze’s suggestion that it could eventually be used as a franchise for rental of electric two-wheelers. “Sachin told me he was not earning enough money while on suspension and that till the time he established himself financially, I should start my own business,” the woman said. The woman, however, said the company did not make any money and she does not know why the amount was credited to the account. “The reason for the same will be known to Sachin Waze.”
