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The accused has been identified as Pravin Ashubha Jadeja aka Pravin Singh aka Pradeep Singh Ashubha Jadeja, a police official said. Image Credit: IANS

Mumbai (Maharashtra): A 38-year-old fugitive has been arrested after 15 years. “He was identified through his two gold teeth”, Mumbai police said on Saturday.

The accused has changed his identity and shifted to Kutch in Gujarat to avoid being caught. “He has been identified as Pravin Ashubha Jadeja aka Pravin Singh aka Pradeep Singh Ashubha Jadeja,” a police official said.

“The accused was charged with cheating and misleading the police. Although after a few days of arrest, the accused got bail from the court. Later, after the hearing, the accused absconded from Mumbai and didn’t appear in court again. Hence the court declared him a fugitive,” the police official said.

“Pravin used to work as a salesman in a cloth shop in 2007. His owner once asked him to collect Rs40,000 from another merchant. Instead of giving the money to his owner, Pravin misled the police and the owner by telling them that someone has stolen his bag full of money from the toilet,” the police official added.

After the investigation, it was revealed that Pravin kept the money with himself and misled the police, the Mumbai police said in a statement.

“The accused was arrested but he absconded after getting bail from the court.”

Talking about their latest search for the accused, Mumbai police said, “A few days ago, the search investigation was resumed by the police in which they interrogated the former associates of the accused and came to know that Pravin is hiding in Sabhrai village of Mandvi Taluka in Kachchh District of Gujarat. The police acted as LIC agents and called Pravin to Mumbai. After confirmation, the accused was arrested”.