A gang in Kanpur, dressed in police uniforms, extorted lakhs in the name of raids. However, the real twist in the story is that the gang wasn’t just dressed as police; its members were actually part of the force.
In a shocking case from Uttar Pradesh’s Kanpur, police arrested five for posing as STF and extortion but were in for a surprise when they learnt that the gang included a home guards, PRD jawans and the kingpin — traffic sub-inspector Ajit Yadav.
According to a Hindustan report, the gang, dressed in police uniforms, started raiding people’s houses in hooter-fitted vehicles. They specifically targeted sex rackets, Oyo hotels and gambling dens and extorted lakhs by beating the residents and threatening to circulate their objectionable videos.
DCP (West) Dinesh Tripathi said that the accused have also confessed to two incidents of robbery. In the interrogation, the accused said they use the Mahadev betting app to receive the extorted money online.
Who are the 5 people arrested in the case?
The arrested accused have been identified as the following:
- Rajiv Dixit, Home Guard
- Varsha Chauhan, PRD jawan
- Arvind Shukla of Kanpur
- Anirudh Singh of Kanpur Dehat
- Anuj Kumar alias Dumpy Yadav of Kannauj
The gang leader, a traffic sub-inspector, is absconding.
How were they caught?
According to media reports, the police gang first came under scanner on Saturday when they extorted a Rawatpur resident, Ambika Singh Chandel.
The gang told Ambika that they were with the STF and threatened to send her to jail in a fake case. They then allegedly beat her and the others present at her home at the time. She was extorted of ₹1.40 lakh in cash while a separate online transaction of ₹30,000 was demanded.
Ambika, suspicious of the gang of 8-10 people, alerted the police. The gang had left the scene by the time the police arrived, but Ambika had noted down their vehicle, which gave the police a lead.
On Wednesday afternoon, the same gang reached the house of Aditya Mishra, a resident of Hanumanth Vihar, when his friends, including female friends, were present. The gang allegedly threatened him with a fake sex racket case and took ₹30,000 cash from him and his friends. They also made an online transfer of ₹1.25 lakh.
Aditya also informed the police of the incident and gave them the vehicle’s numbers.
