4 members of extortion racket held, one injured in police encounter

Busting an extortion module, the Amritsar city police have arrested four persons while one of them was injured following a brief encounter near Company Bagh area here today.

Those arrested included Simaratpal Singh and Amandeep Singh — both residents of Saidoke village in Mehta — Harpreet Singh alias Happy of Bhaini Miyan Khan village in Gurdaspur and Simarat Pal Singh of Rampura village.

Apart from them, the police have also nominated their Spain-based accomplice Sukhdev Singh, who hails from Rampura village and is Simratpal’s brother.

He was making the threatening extortion calls to a local businessman. They used to identify potential targets and used the name of notorious gangster Bony Bal for the extortion, said Police Commissioner Gurpreet Singh Bhullar.

Sharing details, Bhullar said the accused Simaratpal and Amandeep Singh, had fired several gun shots outside an under-construction banquet hall on the outskirts of the city, after which the owner had received an extortion call from a foreign number. They fired at the display board and shot the video and sent it to the victim for extortion.

The victim lodged a complaint with the police and a case was registered at Sadar police station on July 21.

Investigations led the police to Simaratpal and Amandeep Singh, who were arrested in the case. Following their interrogation, the police identified the remaining two accused Simrat Pal and Harpreet Singh — who had masterminded the extortion along with NRI Sukhdev Singh. Both of them worked as bouncers. They were sharing the details of their victims with Sukhdev Singh, who was then making threatening calls using the name of notorious gangsters.

Harpreet and Simrat Pal were held from Company Bagh area and an illegal pistol was recovered from their possession. Harpreet snatched the carbine of a cop. Alerted by this ASI Balwinder Singh shot him with his service weapon in self-defence. He was later admitted to Guru Nanak Dev Hospital for treatment.

Besides extortion, the police registered a fresh FIR under the Arms act against them at Civil Lines police station here.