IT News
Mumbai Jan 23
A case was filed at City Chowk Police station in Aurangabad (Maharashtra) against former Indian cricket team captain and ex-MP Mohammed Azharuddin and two others for allegedly cheating a local travel agent for Rs. 20,96,311/-
The complaint was lodged by Shahab Y. Mohammed (49), proprietor of Danish Tours & Travels and a former executive with the defunct Jet Airways.
The first information report (FIR) was registered against Mujeeb Khan (Aurangabad), Sudheesh Avikkal (Kerala) and Mohammed Azharuddin (Hyderabad). No arrests were made and further investigations were on, Investigating Officer A.D. Nagre said.
According to the complainant, Avikkal booked several international airline tickets like Mumbai-Dubai-Paris, Paris-Turin, Turin-Paris, Turin-Amsterdam, Turin-Munich-Amsterdam, Paris-Dubai-Delhi, Copenhagen-Amsterdam, Amsterdam-Manchester, Amsterdam-Zagreb, etc. in various names, between 9 and 12 November, 2019.
On one occasion, Azharuddin and Avikkal, travelled to Paris where they met three others and booked other tickets, mostly business class, in top airlines. Though Avikkal didn’t have money, he insisted that it was an emergency and told Mohammed Shahab, that he would pay the ticket charges. Mohammed, relented only after Mujeeb Khan(who is the personal secretary to Azharuddin) gave an assurance on behalf of Sudheesh Avikkal. Whereas Avikkal said he would make a part-payment of Euro 13,500 ( Rs 10,60,000), for the tickets through his bank account in the “Croatian National Bank”. He showed Shahab an email purportedly sent by him to the bank on 12 November 2019.
“I was instructed to book many tickets, cancel tickets, re-book fresh tickets, re-issue, reschedule, etc, which I did on the assurance that the payment was forthcoming. But, on 15 November 2019, the Croatian National Bank informed me that no payments was received from Avikkal,”
Saddled with a ticketing bill of over Rs 2 million, Mohammed tried to speak to Azharuddin and Khan, but they reportedly evaded him, although Avikkal on 24 November said that he was clearing the full payment of Rs 21,45,000 in favour of the travel agency. Avikkal also sent a copy of the cheque issued in favour of “Danish Tours & Travels” for the amount on WhatsApp, to Mohammed. But the cheque reportedly bounced and Mohammed did not receive any payment. Resultantly he lodged a complaint with police.
Mohammed allegedly that for the past two weeks, Khan and the others have been even hoodwinking the police that the payment will be made “anytime”, but nothing came and finally the FIR was registered against them. Mohammed Azharuddin couldn’t be reached.