Criminal declared ‘dead’ by wife arrested in Ahmedabad, sent back to jail

Vadodara: In a dramatic twist, a notorious criminal—previously declared dead through a forged death certificate submitted by his wife in the Gujarat high court—was arrested by the Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) in Ahmedabad and subsequently sent back to Vadodara Central Jail.The accused, Ashish Shah, had been incarcerated at Vadodara Central Jail after being booked in April 2022 for preparing bogus documents related to the Gujarat high court in a case registered in Anand. He secured parole under the pretext of seeking medical treatment and was granted a 14-day release in July 2022. Shah continued to receive extensions on parole until March 2024.In a bold attempt to evade further imprisonment, Shah's wife submitted a forged death certificate to the HC, claiming he had died. However, the court identified the document as fake and registered an offence against him. A search operation was launched, and Shah was eventually tracked down and arrested in Ahmedabad."He created a lot of drama to avoid arrest, but we took him into custody," said a DCB official.Shah has an extensive criminal history across multiple districts, including Vadodara, Ahmedabad, Anand, and Panchmahal. He had previously forged a death certificate for the sister of bootlegger Alpesh Wadhwani in an attempt to secure his bail, for which the Vadodara Crime Branch registered an offence.He was also accused of cheating the father of an accused arrested for hoarding Remdesivir injections during the pandemic in 2021. Shah allegedly took Rs 2.5 lakh to secure bail and then produced forged court documents. Additionally, Shah was involved in a cheating case filed by Sayajigunj police in 2015. He had helped a woman defraud an insurance company of Rs 1.56 lakh using fake voter ID and PAN card documents.Further cases of cheating have also been filed against him by the Ahmedabad and Panchmahal police for siphoning off insurance money from unsuspecting victims.