Mumbai: Robbery at stylist Neerusha Nikhat's house raises alarm

The filing of an FIR in Mumbai's Goregaon West police station by television industry's biggest stylist-designer Neerusha Nikhat after a maid fled with cash and jewellery from her house, might be just the tip of the ice-berg in a well-organised scam to rob clientele by the agency, Neerusha has charged.

When Neerusha's full time domestic help of 13 years, Meena Mandal took time off to go back to her village in West Bengal, the single mom, Neerusha, who lives with her sister Nazia and 13-year-old son Manaal approached kaamwalibais.com for a 24x7 help. “The agency reassured me when I told them that security was my biggest concern that they rigorously verify all candidates,” says the designer who paid Rs 17,900 upfront. “After the money transfer, an agency representative came with a 22-year-old Alinka Kirtik Wadlik nee Thorat.”

Alinka said she was a commerce graduate from Osmanabad who her parents married off to an abusive man. “She said she fled the marriage and came to Mumbai to work. After someone allegedly tried to rape her in an office she quit that job and registered to work as a help,” recounts Neerusha, “I was very moved. When she said she wanted to become a CA, I promised to fund her education and even find her work.”

Within four days of Alinka beginning work Neerusha's old maid also came back. “I decided to keep them both as I didn't want either to lose jobs,” says Neerusha who soon found Alinka spending hours on the phone with a bluetooth device clipped on her ear. “I felt suspicious since we heard her speaking about the house and us. She was evasive on queries.”

Neerusha then went on to look at the documents the agency had provided and found that apart from copies of the pan and aadhar card, a photograph and a receipt of Rs 1,000 from kaamwalibais.com there was little else. “When I called them, one Reshma kept bouncing off my calls for proof of police verification, escalating my suspicion. When I got aggressive, she promised to send it in a day.” The next day onwards Neerusha became wary of leaving her son with Alinka and told her she was sending someone from her office to pick him from school. “Yet she turned up at the school and was telling someone about her coordinates.”

On September 7, an hour after Meena Mandal left to drop Manaal at school around 7.30 am she came and woke Neerusha up as she had find Alinka's stuff lying all over the help's room. “She was nowhere in sight and so were her bags. I panicked and looked around the house to find several new bed sheets, footwear, expensive fabrics which I stock at home and even some utensils were missing,” Mandal remembers. Neerusha says the worst shock was when she went to her own room to check “The cash I left in the room and the jewellery which I wanted to return to the bank locker were also missing.”

Neerusha's repeated attempts at reaching kaamwalibais.com saw them beign elusive and so she called the police and had an FIR registered a copy of which is with DNA. Senior PI Sanjeev Bhole of the Goregaon West confirmed that investigations were on-going. “Alinka is not answering her phone and we couldn't find her at the address registered with kaamwalibais.com. I have two members of the team who are working on this case.”

The police have told Neerusha to inform the school about the maid since she was seen near the school gate on the same day she fled the house. “The complainant's son saw her near the gate and we don't want to take any chances,” Bhole said.

When DNA called kaamwalibais.com owner Suraj Agarwal, he insisted Alinka would not steal. “This is a Maharashtrian girl. Mostly peoople who cheat/rob are from UP/Bihar. She's a graduate and has given us aadhar and pan card details which no criminal would do.” He underlined how his 12-year-old agency had a data bank of 16,022 candidates. “I've placed 8,000 plus maids across the city. Why has this not happned anywhere else?”

On Alinka's police verification papers his subordinate Reshma had told Neerusha will be sent across he said: “We don't do police verification. That is the client's responsibility. They should take them to the local police.” When asked why Reshma had then promised to send proff of the verification he said: “She is just an employee. I have never done any police checking for anyone on my database.”

He also admitted he nver checked out the addresses mentioned by the candidates. “90% of them are from outside Mumbai. Even if they are, we can't go looking for all their addresses, can we?” he asked.

'SHE DIDN'T STEAL'

• Kaamwalibais.com owner Suraj Agarwal, insisted that Alinka, the accused bai, is not the thief. He believes “those from UP/Bihar steal, but not Maharashtrians”.
   
• He claimed she’s a graduate and had even submitted Aadhaar and pan details, which “no criminal would.”