Filmmaker Mahesh Manjrekar Receives Rs 35 Crore Extortion Call From Tea Seller, Accused Arrested

A Tea seller from Mumbai attempted to extort Rs 35 crore from director-actor Mahesh Manjrekar. Accused sent to police custody till September 2.

Bollywood filmmaker-actor Mahesh Manjrekar received an extortion call from a person claiming to be a member of the underworld don Abu Salem’s gang. He attempted to extort Rs 35 crore from Manjrekar. However, the anti-extortion cell has arrested the accused who was trying to extort Rs 35 crores through a threat call. The person turned out to be a tea-seller in Mumbai. He has been arrested from Maharashtra’s Ratnagiri.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Akbar Pathan identified the accused as Milind B. Tulsankar, 34, living in Diva town of Thane. As per the investigations, Tulsankar had made threat calls between August 23-25 to Manjrekar, posing as a henchman of jailed mafia don Abu Salem. He demanded Rs 35 crore as extortion money to be delivered via hawala and warned Manjrekar of dire consequences if he failed to comply.

Manjrekar approached the Dadar police and the case was taken over by the Anti-Extortion Cell which started the probe with three teams fanning out in Thane and Ratnagiri. Using techint, they finally managed to track down Tulsankar to Khed town in Ratnagiri, nabbed him and brought him to Mumbai. He was produced before a court which sent him to police custody till September 2.

Upon interrogation, he revealed that he was inspired by videos of a mafia don’s extortion style on social media, managed to get Manjrekar’s number from a website and got into the act.

Investigations are on to ascertain if Tulsankar had made similar calls to any other persons, said Pathan.

On Thursday, the filmmaker lauded the Mumbai police for their ‘swift action’ in getting a 35-year-old, accused of demanding extortion from the director, in their custody. He tweeted, “A Big Thank You to the @CPMumbaiPolice & The Anti-extortion cell for the swift action in getting the culprit in custody. Bravo @MumbaiPolice”.

On the work front, Manjrekar, the national award-winning filmmaker is known for directing critically acclaimed movies including Viruddh, Vaastav: The Reality, Astitva. He has acted in Wanted, Dabangg 3, Saho, Kesari to name a few.

(With inputs from agencies)