Owners of 1Above pub arrested in Mumbai for not paying PF amount of Rs 8.65 lakh to 100 employees

The three owners of the 1Above pub, which was gutted in a fire in the Kamala Mills Compound in Mumbai last year, were arrested on Thursday for allegedly not having paid Provident Fund (PF) to the tune of Rs 8.65 lakh to nearly 100 employees.

NM Joshi Marg police arrested Kripesh Sanghvi, his brother Jigar and their partner Abhijeet Mankar, confirmed Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), Zone III, Virendra Mishra.

Representational image. AFP

The trio was booked on 20 January, according to The Hindu, for deducting money from nearly 100 employees' salaries and not depositing it in their Provident Fund accounts. Provident Fund forms a part of the cost to company (CTC) and it is mandatory for the employer to maintain such an account under the Employees’ Provident Fund Act of 1952.

The three of them have been booked under Section 406 (punishment for criminal breach of trust) and Section 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant, or by banker, merchant or agent) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 14 (filing prosecution against defaulters) of Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Act 1952, reported Hindustan Times. The case was registered after the Kamala Mills fire and the arrests were made on Thursday, the DCP told PTI. They were produced before the Bhoiwada court and are now in police custody.

The 1Above owners were already in custody in connection with the Kamala Mills fire case, along with Mojo's Bistro's owners Yug Pathak and Yug Tulli.

"The three were in Arthur Road jail. We got them to the police station and arrested them again,” NM Joshi Marg police station's senior police inspector Ahmed Pathan told The Indian Express. According to the report, the investigation revealed that the three of them had not paid the Provident Fund amount from May 2017 to November 2017.

The trio will remain in police custody till 10 February, said Pathan.

The Sanghvis and Mankar were arrested in connection with the 29 December, 2017, fire at the Kamala Mills in which 14 people were killed. 1 Above and another pub Mojo's Bistro were gutted in the devastating blaze. The pubs shared a common terrace.

The two brothers and Mankar were charged with culpable homicide not amounting to murder, among other offences, police had said.

With inputs from PTI