Sources say that the house was jointly owned by Sharma and another Dawood associate. Dawood's mother Ameena also took refuge in the Hauz Khas house. However, sources claim that Sharma later sold the house to a third party. Addl DCP Vivek Gogia said the police are still verifying the ownership of the house. ``We cannot say anything conclusively without completing our investigations.''

Today, the house has a gymnasium on the ground floor. The caretaker of the house, Murali, told The Indian Express, ``This house belongs to Romesh Sharma. He had some offices here. But he has closed all operations now. Last month, he renovated the house. He wanted to run a gym here.Though the gym is ready, it has not opened to outsiders as yet.''

Prem Bahadur, who was the security guard when Savia stayed there, continues to do duty. He is known as Sharma's man among the newly-appointed staff. Bahadur said, ``Sharmaji hardly comes here now. Earlier, he had his office here. In fact, a month ago he started renovating the house. Construction work is still on at the back of the main building. There's a family living on the second floor of the house. The offices on the first floor are locked.''

Meanwhile, a special team of the Delhi Police has taken Romesh Sharma to Allahabad last evening. The team hopes to recover the original contract of the controversial helicopter deal which Sharma struck with Mumbai aviation company owner Suresh Rao and has apparently kept in the Allahabad house. The investigating officials also hope to recover the accused's revolver from his house there. Addl SHO (Hauz Khas) Anand Shukla is heading the team. Sharma is expected to be brought back to the Capitaltomorrow evening.

The investigating officials are also in the process of verifying the ownership of 32 properties, the documents of which were recovered by the police from Sharma's Mayfair residence last Tuesday. The list of 32 properties includes 21 properties in the Capital, six in Mumbai, four in Uttar Pradesh and one in Haryana.

A senior South district police officer said, ``The list includes prime land like the Vishwayatan Yog Ashram on 68, Ashoka Road. Sharma had already prepared the duplicate documents of the land. These documents have been seized from his Mayfair Gardens residence. The inmates of the ashram are apparently unaware of Sharma's designs.''

The police say that Sharma adopted a specific modus operandi to acquire property wherein he identified disputed, heirless property or those belonging to widows and NRIs. He gathered maximum information about the property, intimidated the owners and made them transfer the ownership of the property under duress.

The Hauz Khas police have alsorecovered 250 cassettes from Sharma's Mayfair residence. Sources told this paper, ``About 60 cassettes have objectionable visuals. It appears that Sharma used the video recordings to blackmail women who fell in his trap.'' The other cassettes include prints of commercial Hindi films, Sharma's election speeches and rallies of prominent politicians.

In a related development, Sharma's aide and a senior director of Modi Rubbers, Ashok Malik, was arrested last night on charges of intimidating his cousin Romesh Malik through Sharma. Ashok Malik was produced in court yesterday and has been taken into judicial custody.