Actor Gautam Rode has always steered clear of controversies and is known to be an actor who is dedicated towards good work in our industry. The actor recently though had to raise his voice when he was cheated by a builder. The actor had booked a flat in May 2016 in Ariisto Sommet, Goregaon hoping to receive it by December 2018 (as per the official confirmation on email) as promised by the builder, Mr. Atithi Narendra Patel. But neither did the construction of the building was completed nor did the builders refund Gautam's money.

Revealing the whole story, Gautam said, "I paid him a booking amount of 1.5 crore as asked by him and a monthly installment of 5 lakhs was set for every month, which I paid till March 2017. This can be confirmed by my bank statement. I gave him a total amount of 2 crores 11 lakhs 95 thousand including tax to the government in the name of Ashvi developers, where Atithi Narendra Patel was the main director and owner of the company. It was only recently that I came to know from one of the websites that he has resigned as a director of his the company. The construction of the building however stopped in October 2016 but I kept paying the instalments till March 2017, hoping for it to start as promised.”

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He further added, "This time I kept asking for the allotment letter without which I couldn’t register the flat. The first time I got anything besides a booking form from Ashvi Developers, was a schedule sheet that was sent to me on email after 10 months of having booked the flat, dated 20th March 2017 in which random slab rates were written which were never discussed and were not part of our deal. This can be testified by Nihar and Siddharth (Common brokers-Pan Properties). The first time I got an allotment letter was in April 2017, but it was dated wrongly and there was no mention of 55 lakhs that I paid to him in instalments and again the slab rates mentioned on this one were different from the ones sent on email earlier. I have a hard copy of it.”

After repeated inquiries, Gautam received no definite answer, which led him to cancel the contract. "I told the builder that I will not pay any more money till the construction of the building starts, to which he called the brokers Nihar and Siddharth and told them that if I didn’t want to pay any further then they would cancel my booking and refund my money. This message was delivered to me by Nihar and Siddharth to which I readily agreed as I had lost faith in the builder. Siddharth (PAN properties) has already testified in EOW about the same. I have saved several text messages and whatsapp messages that I received from Atithi Narendra Patel and Dhrupad Jhaveri (Sales head of Ashvi developers and he is Atithi Narendra Patel’s brother in law), in which Atithi Narendra Patel has written that I am in his first list of payments and he has thanked me for understanding his situation and keeping patience. And he will close the deal at the earliest. But he never kept his word.”

“After patiently waiting for more than a year when I did not get any positive reply about either the construction of the building or on the return of my money, I went to the Economic Offences Wing and lodged an FIR against the builder. The construction of the building (Aristo Sommet, Goregaon West) has still not started. I’ve suffered a lot, but I have full faith in the judicial system and am positive that I will get justice," the actor concluded.

On work front, Gautam Rode will be back on television after a gap of almost two years. He will be seen playing the lead role in the second season of Kaal Bhairav Rahasya.