After 5 years in jail, Palghar man uses RTI to win bail

A 39-year-old automobile engineer, Sachin Sambare, who was imprisoned for nearly five years on rape charges, was released on bail on March 10 after filing a petition in the Bombay High Court from jail, alleging that he was a victim of an extortion racket involving women lawyers, police officers and others.

The petitioner, Sachin Sambare, claimed that certain women lawyers befriend men on a matrimonial site, dating apps and other social media platforms and eventually coerce them into entering physical relationships. Later, they demand vast amounts of money, threatening them with false rape accusations. He alleged that he fell victim to such a gang after coming in contact with a woman lawyer in 2017 and was subsequently wrongfully imprisoned for four years and nine months.

After coming across multiple similar cases in newspapers, he filed an RTI to gather information about the woman lawyer who accused him. The RTI revealed that the lawyer who accused him of rape had allegedly ruined the lives of at least five other men using an identical modus operandi. He obtained details of six rape FIRs registered in various police stations. Additionally, 22 criminal cases had been filed against the complainant and her family across Maharashtra and the charges included cheating, extortion, forgery, trespassing and theft.

Petitioner’s allegations

Sambare, a resident of Vikramgarh, Palghar, was working as a manager for an international bus brand. In a conversation with mid-day, he alleged that the woman who accused him of rape is part of a larger extortion racket. “The modus operandi of the syndicate, which includes women lawyers, is to befriend working men, get into physical relationships with them and later fabricate financial troubles to ask for money. If the men refuse, they blackmail them with false rape accusations. Members of this gang even appear as witnesses in the FIRs,” he said.

Once a complaint is lodged, a specific police officer from the station concerned summons the accused for an “inquiry,” threatening them with arrest. The officer then suggests a settlement, demanding large sums of money to make the case disappear.

Sambare recounted that he met the woman in 2017 on Shaadi.com, where she introduced herself as a lawyer—though she was not one at that time, as she obtained her law degree only in 2021. Over time, their conversations deepened, and they began meeting regularly.

She frequently asked him for money under various pretexts, and he provided financial help multiple times. However, in 2019, when she asked for R5 lakh and he refused, she filed a rape complaint against him at Rabale police station.

The investigating officer demanded R10 lakh to “settle” the case, but when he refused, he was arrested on June 23, 2020. The officer seized his car and also froze his bank account.

“The investigating officer was in close contact with the complainant’s lawyers. After my arrest, he pressured my family members, which led my mother to withdraw R2 lakh from an ATM and hand it over to him. The officer then froze my bank account,” Sambare said.

“During the pandemic, when my mother fell seriously ill, my family had no money for her treatment. Since my bank account was frozen, they were unable to withdraw funds. Due to the lack of money, my mother did not receive timely medical care and tragically passed away,” he added.

“After my arrest, an officer from the Rabale Police demanded R10 lakh from my family. When we refused to pay, he defamed me by spreading false news in the media, claiming that I had duped more than 30 women. However, when the charge sheet was filed, no other names appeared—only the woman who was the main complainant in my case,” he said.

Behind bars

While in jail, Sambare read newspapers and came across cases from Punjab and Haryana, where high courts had rejected the bail application of a woman accused of honey-trapping and filing nine fake rape cases within 14 months. Similarly, the Jabalpur bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court took cognisance of another woman filing six cases from 2016 to 2022, all accusing men of ‘raping her on the pretext of marriage’.

Last year, the Karnataka High Court dealt with multiple rape cases filed by a woman, who had accused 10 different people of rape over 10 years. The court directed the state DGP to alert all police stations about such fake cases.

“I sought information from the department concerned through RTI regarding how many rape cases the lawyer had registered, against whom, and in which police stations. It was not easy, but after multiple appeals, I started receiving information. The RTI responses revealed that from 2012 to 2025, she had filed rape charges against six people, including me, in Vashi, Tilak Nagar, Palghar, Rabale, CBD Belapur, and, most recently, at Lonavala Gramin police station in February 2025.

All the accused were doctors, engineers, government employees and businessmen. After gathering information, I found that some had been acquitted, some were out on bail, and in some cases, a B-summary had been filed. In the case registered at the Lonavala police station, she accused a man working in London of raping her on the pretext of marriage. I compiled details from these reports, along with high court orders, and submitted them to the Navi Mumbai commissioner and other police officials, demanding an inquiry and action against the woman. However, no officer took my complaint seriously,” he said.

Legal recourse

“In September 2024, I filed a writ petition in the high court, submitting judgments from Punjab, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh, along with records of the six rape cases filed by the lawyer and 206 pages of supporting documents,” Sambare said.

“Meanwhile, I applied for bail twice in the sessions court and twice in the high court. Each time, the accused lawyer appeared in court with her legal team, alleging that I was threatening and defaming her. As a result, my bail applications were rejected. The court never heard my petitions on merit.

In January this year, I sent a reminder letter to the court requesting a hearing on my pending writ petition,” he added.

Observing that genuine rape cases suffer due to false allegations, a Bombay High Court division bench of Justices Revati Mohite-Dere and Dr Neela Gokhale directed the director general of police (DGP), Maharashtra, to investigate the claims made by the petitioner and submit a report to the court within eight weeks.

Sambare has also sought an inquiry against a police officer allegedly involved in filing false rape cases.

“This false case has destroyed my world, my career—everything. I don`t know how I will rebuild my life. Strict action must be taken against women who misuse the law for their advantage so that this kind of crime can be stopped,” he said.

Activist Speak

Deepika Narayan Bhardwaj, documentary filmmaker and director of Ekam Nyaay Foundation, said, “Thanks to Justice Revati Mohite Dere and Justice Neela Gokhale this man is being heard after suffering for years. Otherwise, no one in the system cares about plight of false rape case accused. I know of at least four more cases within Mumbai where one woman has filed multiple rape cases against different men, alleging false promise of marriage by all in order to either force marriage or extortion. I had personally written to the Mumbai police commissioner to form a special investigation team to look into one such case, but there was no response. It is a tragedy that and police, who are themselves custodians of law are abusing rape laws. If they are not shying away from misusing law to commit extortion, imagine what regular people would be doing. Lives are being destroyed due to false rape cases. I have worked on cases where men are victims of serial rape case filers who have filed anything from three to 19 rape cases only to extort money and police has taken no action. It is time to stop this menace. I hope the chief minister takes cognisance of this case and orders an inquiry into all such cases across Maharashtra.

`Allegations are baseless`

Meanwhile, Tukaram Nimbalkar, the police officer who arrested Sambare, stated, “All the allegations against me are false and baseless. The Human Rights Commission has also conducted an inquiry into the matter. The ACP of Vashi division had carried out an investigation, but the report did not support the claims made by the complainant [Sambare]. Now that the court has ordered an inquiry, the truth will finally come to light.

Asked why Sambare`s bank account was frozen, he said, “The accused was absconding, which necessitated this action.”