FIR Against Habitual Sex Offender Brings Aarey Metro Car Shed Back in Focus: Crimeophobia
by Crimeophobia Bureau
Mumbai’s Aarey Metro Car Shed, once projected as a flashpoint of environmental conscience, now stands exposed for something far more disturbing. The site has re-entered public discourse not because of land or trees, but because it has allegedly enabled sustained sexual exploitation of a vulnerable woman, exposing catastrophic failures of security, policing, and institutional accountability. Previously, Crimeophobia Team had also submitted its official Intervention Applications to courts and formal complaints with the Police that the Activist have no issues with a Muslim Builder burning Forest for constructing Film Studios in Royal Palms (Aarey) but they continue to protest for Forest been cut for Metro Carshed. While Aarey activists continue to selectively manufacture outrage for personal and publicity-driven gains, Crimeophobia has once again stepped in on a pro bono basis to support the real conflict—one involving human safety, dignity, and survival.
The Aarey Metro Car Shed is now back in the news for all the wrong reasons. Earlier, it symbolised environmental resistance and land-use conflict. Today, it stands accused of becoming an unsafe zone where sexual exploitation allegedly occurred repeatedly, including within restricted premises. A criminal case emerging from Mumbai’s Aarey Milk Colony lays bare not just an individual crime, but a deeper collapse involving a habitual sex offender, multi-layered security lapses, and deliberate delays in police action. We have chosen to conceal the names of the Victim & Accused for the benefit of Victim-Protection.
Locals refer to the accused as a habitual sex offender who allegedly honeytrapped multiple vulnerable women by promising marriage, only to abandon them after satisfying himself. In the present case, the victim managed to reach Criminologist Snehil Dhall, who counselled her and thereafter immediately directed the Crimeophobia team to assist her on a pro bono basis in an effort to secure justice. The complainant is a widowed housekeeping worker employed at the Aarey Metro Car Shed. Limited education, language barriers, and economic dependence placed her in a position of acute vulnerability. The accused, her co-worker and neighbour, allegedly exploited this vulnerability through sustained emotional manipulation, repeated promises of marriage, and alleged financial fraud. He assured her that her widowhood and child would not affect their future together, deliberately cultivating emotional dependence over several months.
Sexual relations followed these assurances. Court filings indicate that the accused himself confessed to having multiple physical relationships with the victim in his anticipatory bail application, while denying responsibility for the child and disputing the ₹6 lakh allegedly taken from the victim under the pretext of supporting his sister’s wedding. Bank withdrawals referenced in the FIR indicate that the amount was handed over in cash without receipts or acknowledgment.
The victim has further alleged that sexual exploitation did not remain confined to hotels or isolated locations. According to her statement, the accused repeatedly had intercourse not only at hotels and secluded public places, but inside the Aarey Metro Car Shed premises, including its terrace, and across various forested areas of Aarey itself. These allegations raise a grave and unavoidable question: how does a sensitive public infrastructure project and a protected forest zone become a recurring site of sexual activity without detection? The Metro Car Shed terrace, by these accounts, effectively turned into a permit-room, with no intervention, no surveillance enforcement, and no accountability.
The Maharashtra State Force is deployed at the car shed, alongside private security contractors. As matter of fact, even this security was initially under private security watchman and only after repeated complaints of Criminologist Snehil Dhall the sensitive infrastructure was handed over to competent security enforcement agency. Perhaps, no one imagined that the Accused could have the audacity of using Metro Carshed terrace as his scene of crime due to which the accused allegedly moved freely without obstruction. Surveillance, access control, and patrolling appear not merely ineffective but virtually nonexistent. As allegations now extend across the forested stretches of Aarey, concerns deepen that security responsibility will once again be shifted from one agency to another, without any agency ever being held accountable.
When the victim and her family first approached Aarey Police Station, they were allegedly ridiculed and dismissed. No immediate FIR was registered. Crimeophobia intervened, interrogated the primary investigation, and advised the victim to approach Vanrai Police Station, since the hotel where some of the incidents occurred fell under Vanrai’s jurisdiction. Vanrai Police took the matter seriously, conducted a dedicated investigation, and subsequently established that the accused had met the victim at the Metro Car Shed and had allegedly engaged in repeated sexual acts within its premises. Apparently, the hotel used to record both Accused-Victim government ID cards as part of their room-booking protocols which assisted the victim to establish the crime did exist while everyone else denied.
It was Vanrai Police who then convinced Aarey Police to take over the investigation, as the Metro Car Shed squarely fell under Aarey Police jurisdiction. Aarey Police eventually accepted the case—by then under visible pressure and embarrassment. Even after taking over, Aarey Police have continued to avoid arrest. Crimeophobia chose to involve its law intern, Ms. Aarvee Makadia, a first-year student of BITS Law College, to draft the written reply on behalf of the victim since she couldn’t speak English or Marathi and the case required multiple translations due to involvement of four languages for the criminal proceedings. Ms. Aarvee was also part of the ground investigation and accompanied the victim along with Forensic Police team at the crime scene. Following Crimeophobia’s sustained pressure, Aarey Police were compelled to direct a forensic van to visit the Metro Car Shed terrace to search for traces and left no procedures pending but they continue to seem reluctant for arresting a habitual sex offender.
The accused has approached the Dindoshi Sessions Court seeking anticipatory bail, with the order scheduled on 4 February. The written reply opposing bail has been drafted by Ms. Aarvee Makadia under instructions from the victim, entirely on a pro bono basis. While Ms. Aarvee completed her in-court proceedings, the investigative coordination has since been carried forward by Ms. Saloni Chitnis, another Crimeophobia intern from the National Forensic Sciences University (NFSU – Gujarat). Coordinating remotely from Nashik, Ms. Saloni questioned Aarey Police official Mr. Khandhaare during a call regarding the continued failure to arrest the accused. The officer updated about victim-protection compensation status but thereafter abruptly disconnected the call. The act spoke louder than any official explanation.
Notably, just before the anticipatory bail hearing, Aarey Police initiated the victim compensation process. Aarey Police informed a Crimeophobia team member that the victim’s brother had been contacted and that the victim needed to visit the police station to sign compensation forms. Crimeophobia continues to follow up to ensure that the victim receives the compensation she is legally entitled to from the government. The psychological damage inflicted on the complainant is severe. Throughout the relationship, her child was treated as an obstacle. The accused allegedly brainwashed her to such an extent that she left her child behind, who is now being cared for by her mother and brothers. The manipulation escalated to the point where the victim executed a written consent on stamp paper, handing over custody and future guardianship of her son to her brothers, as she continues to pursue the accused with a singular and tragic fixation on marriage. Crimeophobia continues to provide counselling support but has taken a firm position to first secure the child’s safety and stability.
People close to the case describe the woman as emotionally unstable and fixated, oscillating between despair and attachment. While this raises child welfare concerns, it is crucial to state that she has committed no crime. She remains a victim whose judgment was impaired through sustained sexual and financial exploitation under false promises of marriage. Criminologists tracking the matter describe a broader and disturbing pattern. The accused is alleged to be a habitual sex offender, with informal complaints suggesting repetition and a consistent strategy of targeting vulnerability. This raises an uncomfortable but necessary question: has the accused not been arrested because he belongs to a marginalised community of Scheduled Castes / Scheduled Tribes? The law provides protection against caste-based misuse, but it does not grant immunity from arrest where credible allegations, corroboration, admissions, and patterns of offending exist. Absence of arrest in such circumstances demands scrutiny.
This case reflects systemic failure at every level. Daily-wage women remain unprotected at workplaces. Grievance mechanisms are weak or absent. Aarey Police response remains dismissive and evasive. Public infrastructure meant to serve citizens has allegedly become unsafe for the very people who maintain it. Aarey’s story has shifted once again. From forests to fences; From land to lives; Every delay emboldens predators; Every silence silences victims and the public institutions must now answer if not the so-called activist who pick-and-choose their publicity stunts for Aarey Metro Carshed.
FIR registered under Sections:
BNS 69: Sexual intercourse with a woman through deceitful means, specifically a false promise of marriage or employment/promotion, where the promise wasn’t intended to be kept.
BNS 318: Deceiving someone to fraudulently or dishonestly cause them to deliver property, allow retention of property, or act/omit to act in a way causing harm.