Khadse-Dawood link: hacker arrested over forgery charges

‘Ethical hacker’ Manish Bhangale, who had accused former Maharashtra minister Eknath Khadse of receiving calls from Karachi-based don Dawood Ibrahim, was arrested on Friday for creating fake phone bills.

This comes as a major relief to the 64-year-old Khadse, a six-term MLA who was no 2 to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. He held 10 portfolios, including revenue, agriculture, excise and minority affairs.

The senior BJP leader also faced charges of land grab in Pune. He was forced to resign on June 4 as there was no option left for the BJP-Shiv Sena saffron alliance in the wake of the Opposition charges.

Bhangale, from Vadodara in Gujarat, was arrested by the Mumbai Crime Branch-CID. According to Bhangale, the landline in Karachi was registered in the name of Dawood’s wife Mehjabeen Shaikh and Khadse’s numbers featured in the call data records. Khadse, however, had denied the charges.

Bhangale had created the fake mobile bill on a computer to show call records between Khadse and Dawood's residence in Pakistan, a CID official said. In May 2016, Bhangale had claimed to have hacked into the authentication process of the Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd in April, which gave him access to Dawood’s telephone records.