On August 29, 2025, a special anti-corruption court in Ahmedabad, India, sentenced 14 individuals, including 11 police officers and a former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA), to life imprisonment for their roles in a 2018 Bitcoin extortion case tied to the collapsed BitConnect Ponzi scheme, per Cointelegraph. Special Judge B.B. Jadav convicted them under the Indian Penal Code for criminal conspiracy, kidnapping for ransom, illegal detention, and assault, as well as the Prevention of Corruption Act for abusing public office, per The Times of India. Life sentences in India require serving at least 14 years before early release eligibility, per Brave New Coin.
The case centers on Shailesh Bhatt, a Surat businessman who lost $293,000 in the BitConnect collapse in January 2018, a multi-billion-dollar Ponzi scheme, per CoinTribune. Bhatt recovered 752 Bitcoin by kidnapping BitConnect developer Dhaval Mavani and employee Piyush Savalia at gunpoint, forcing Mavani to transfer 2,256 BTC and an additional $2.1 million, per Coinedition. He paid Savalia $50,000 for silence and used proceeds to buy real estate and gold, per The Block.
In February 2018, Amreli police officers, led by Superintendent Jagdish Patel and Inspector Anant Patel, along with former MLA Nalin Kotadiya, kidnapped Bhatt, holding him at a farmhouse for three days, per Bitcoinist. They beat him until he confessed to the 752 BTC, demanding all 176 BTC from his partner Kirit Paladiya plus 32 crore rupees ($3.6 million), per. When negotiations failed, they forced Bhatt to sell 34 BTC from Paladiya’s wallet, extorting $150,000, per CoinEdition. Gold seized from Patel’s home was confiscated, per.
Bhatt filed a complaint with the Gujarat Criminal Investigation Department, exposing the police extortion, but investigations uncovered his crimes, leading to his August 2024 arrest under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, per BitcoinEthereumNews. He faces charges for kidnapping Mavani and Savalia, extorting 2,091 BTC, 11,000 Litecoin, and ₹14.5 crore ($1.6 million) in cash, per The Block. No further updates on Bhatt’s case are available, per.
BitConnect founder Satish Kumbhani, who recruited Bhatt, is a fugitive, arrested twice in India but released on bail, fleeing to Dubai after his 2019 arrest, per. He faces U.S. indictment and an open arrest warrant, per. BitConnect defrauded investors of over $2 billion, per.
