UNSEAMLY: Tax-cheat Mohan Ramchandani (left) faces jail time after Vijay Tharwani ratted him out as payback for a false immigration rumor. (
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Shakespeare couldn’t have stitched together a better plot.
In a twisted tale of greed and revenge, an immigrant tailor who built his fortune selling suits to the rich and famous is headed to prison — thanks to his own unbridled arrogance and a bitter falling-out with a former protégé.
Mohan Ramchandani faces at least one year behind bars — about the same amount of time the ex-apprentice, Vijay Tharwani, spent in federal detention on false charges he claims were cooked up by Ramchandani.
“I just want him to feel how it feels when someone rats you out, when you lose your money and you end up behind bars,” Tharwani said.
Ramchandani, 66, and Tharwani, 33, were once so close that the older man referred to the younger one as his nephew.
Ramchandani took Tharwani under his wing after he immigrated to the United States at age 16. Tharwani began learning the trade at Mohan’s Custom Tailors on 42nd Street, where the likes of Patrick Ewing, Walt Frazier and Ed Koch bought suits.
Tharwani earned a college degree, got married and bought a home.
But there were conflicts with Ramchandani’s son, who resented his role in the tailoring empire, he said.
In 2008, Tharwani opened Custom Men in Midtown providing the same type of bespoke clothing as Mohan’s. The competition was a bad fit for his former employer and Tharwani said Ramchandani’s son threatened to have him deported.
Tharwani was arrested in January 2009 on suspicion of having a bogus green-card marriage. He believes Ramchandani provided false evidence about the union to authorities.
After 10 months in jail and a two-day trial in early 2010, the marriage-fraud charges were dismissed and he was released.
Tharwani’s clothing business was in tatters and his home in foreclosure. He began to rebuild his company, but faced obstacles.
“Mohan called up the suppliers in Hong Kong and he warned them that if they continue doing business with me, he will stop doing business with them,” he contends.
Custom Men received negative online reviews posted by customers whose names Tharwani didn’t recognize. One review even advertised purported sex acts performed by Tharwani.
“They kept on harassing me, day in and day out,” he said. “That’s when I thought, ‘Enough is enough.’ ”
Tharwani called Thane Rosenbaum, a lawyer on his immigration case, and revealed something he had kept quiet during his time in detention — Ramchandani was a tax cheat.
Tharwani provided evidence to authorities that Ramchandani not only cooked the books, but had the bizarre habit of creating phony numbers that always added up to a multiple of 10.
Attorney General Eric Schneiderman filed a suit under the state’s False Claim Act.
As part of his guilty plea last week, Ramchandani admitted raking in $28 million in sales from 2002 to 2012, but reporting only $5.6 million.
Ramchandani, of Elmhurst, agreed to pay $5.5 million in back taxes and penalties. He would not comment on Tharwani. Shelly Kravitz, his longtime advertising rep, said the tailor feels betrayed by his protégé.
As a whistleblower, Tharwani will get not only his revenge, but a $1.1 million reward, less legal fees. He said he will pay down his debts.
Asked why he did not report the tax fraud earlier, when it could have helped his immigration case, he said he did not think about it.
“I was just counting the days to get out and start my life again,” he said.