Conman Kiran Patel’s arrest in Jammu and Kashmir is just the tip of the iceberg. Focusing on the Jammu and Kashmir police’s so-called inefficiency and administrative competence – or the lack of it – would be papering over the obvious issues.
Two pertinent questions scream out. How could he defraud the system entirely on his own? And, to put it pointedly, who are the forces behind Kiran Patel, running a network stealthily that has eluded the law so far?
Vibes of India has learnt that Kiran Patel visited Russia and even bragged about how he was sent to review the country’s position and military policies on the war in Ukraine. Before visiting Russia, he reportedly enjoyed a Z-plus level of security in Jammu and Kashmir. He became a regular in Kashmir.
He was reportedly arrested after a Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) member, Atul Vaidya, persistently followed up with the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) about his seedy activities.
“He was posting weird videos showing himself around police personnel and in sensitive locations. Knowing this scamster, I sensed he was up to some mischief. Nowhere had he mentioned in his tweets that he was with the PMO or on official work which raised my suspicion,” Atul Vaidya said. He had a significant hand in belling the cat – more of it later.
Smug at the adulation he had been enjoying, Patel started making WhatsApp calls to a few people in Gujarat. Stories are circulating about how he bragged about his trips to Kashmir, insisting he was Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s chosen one. He would have others believe that he was in J&K to realise the PM’s dream of bringing Kashmiri apples to Kutch. He also crowed about how he was assessing the preparedness of India’s armed forces if “our dirty neighbours” indulged in mischief owing to India’s hard stance against China.
That he has a doctorate is another of his phoney claims. He declares that he has a PhD from the University of Virginia. He backs it up with statements like his dissertation “projecting humans as brand” mesmerised the university so much that it did not want him to “waste” time on the campus. It may be noted here that the US does not offer part-time PhDs. Campus presence is mandatory in the US unless it is an honorary doctorate conferred upon prominent personalities.
Back to the role of Vaidya, who met Patel last September at a prayer meeting to offer condolences for the death of VHP leader Dharmendra Maharaj. It was here that he boasted how he has progressed in life and is now an additional director at the PMO, Vaidya said. Knowing Patel’s loose talks, Vaidya ignored him.
Gujarat-based crime journalist Bankim Patel credits Vaidya for exposing Patel. According to Bankim, Vaidya hatched a plot involving his friend, a businessman from Delhi. Vaidya, the businessman, and Patel met at an ITC Hotel on February 7. Spinning one of his fictitious tales, Patel requested Rs 25 lakh to resolve an issue. The money was granted. Later, Vaidya called him to ascertain if he was indeed with the PMO and would do the work for which he borrowed the amount.
Bankim says Kiran took offence at being questioned and offered to return the money if Vaidya didn’t trust him. To Vaidya’s surprise, Patel remitted Rs 15 lakh, saying he wasn’t keen to work on the issue. Asked about the balance of Rs 10 lakh, Patel said he made the transfer to the Delhi businessman, which of course was just another of his unabashed lies.
Now aghast, Vaidya made inquiries with a sense of urgency. He called Patel who said he was in Kashmir on an official visit. Patel also WhatsApped pictures in bulletproof vehicles and told Vaidya that he has Z-Plus level security for a mission in J&K. A local journalist close to Vaidya says the latter tipped off the Delhi police. Following Patel’s tweets, the police arrested him at Hotel Lalit in Srinagar.
As the truth unravels, people are perplexed at the way Patel pulled a fast one on them. A local shop in Maninagar in Ahmedabad, oblivious to his scheming ways, admitted that it printed his PMO visiting cards.
This man has so many layers. He talks big, brags ceaselessly, holds conversations laced with wit, and has an uncanny sense of humour. What made him even more believable was the way he spared no digs at the system.
From Rahul Gandhi to actress and social media influencer Urfi Javed, the range of his barbs was huge. For sure, he would never comment on the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), Prime Minister Modi and Veer Savarkar.
When Modi lost his mother Heeraben Modi in December 2022, he highlighted the simplicity and emotional upheaval of the prime minister. He foregrounded the way the PM returned to work via a video conference after her cremation. He compared PM Modi with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel who had received a telegram of his wife’s death while he was arguing a case in a Bombay court.
He became upwardly mobile in the last two years. From borrowing scooters from neighbours and friends to driving a Porsche, the sudden transformation in lifestyle, especially after visits to Russia and Kashmir, was hard to miss. The change was reflected in his political outspokenness too.
In the middle of 2020, he would spread the word that the PM wasn’t pleased with the way the then Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani was managing the COVID-19 pandemic. Patel claimed he had been sent to Gujarat temporarily to help the BJP. Typical of the man, he would concoct stories at will: how he set up help groups involving doctors and hospitals, and the way he offered oxygen cylinders, ambulances, hospital beds and Remdesivirs medicines to those who needed them. The claims stretched to him spearheading multiple help groups in Ahmedabad. He wouldn’t miss a chance to praise RSS’s humanitarian work. WhatsApp remained his key PR vehicle.
About 17 months back, one afternoon he walked into the Vibes of India office with a bunch of papers. The papers, he tried to make us believe, were meant to uncover someone who was cheating the government. He stacked over 1,000 pages and categorised them with notes. We realised they were all fake. Patel wanted to become an OSD (Officer on Special Duty) with the Gujarat government but was rejected owing to a lack of credentials. That he refused to share any legitimate document to support his claims strengthened our belief that he was a dangerous scamster trying to win over the media.
How then could he comfortably spoof the entire J&K administration?
It couldn’t be the handiwork of one man. No newspaper reported his supposedly outstanding work during COVID. There was never a report published about his association with the PMO. Interestingly, in Gujarat, he never distributed his visiting cards. He would travel in rickshaws, wear rugged clothes and chappals and had no social presence except on Twitter.
At least six journalists Vibes of India spoke to admitted that he came across as a two-faced personality.
According to a senior Gujarati politician, Patel was a small-time fraud — he would just manage free cups of tea banging drums about his powerful network — who graduated into being a full-time scammer.
The moot question is how is it possible to deceive an entire system without support? Are the police and the administration in J&K so inept that they allowed a fraudster to become their guest? The Jammu & Kashmir administration cannot permit Z-plus level security on its own. The status agreement involves mammoth paperwork. The green signal comes from Delhi. Manufacturing scapegoats in J&K is easier than getting into the critical details and nabbing the people who took the nation for a ride.
Earlier, police complaints were registered against Patel in Gujarat’s Raopura Police Station, Naroda Police Station, and Bayad Police Station. Yet the man went scot-free. A senior BJP member said it’s anybody’s guess what the situation would have been had the person involved wasn’t Kiran Patel but Kamruddin Pathan.
Deepal Trivedi is the CEO and founder editor of www.vibesofindia.com.
This article first appeared on Vibes of India.
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