Man held on ‘extortion’ charge in Sirmaur

Tribune News Service

Solan, January 10

The Sirmaur police today arrested a person, Anwar Ali of Bhagvanpur area in Majra, for extortion on a complaint by a local contractor from whom he had demanded Rs 10 lakh.

The Sirmaur Superintendent of Police, Souyma Sambasivan, said Anwar was in touch with some girls from Palampur and Punjab who would lure men and then demand a huge amount of money. One such complaint was made by a local contractor from Mishrwala whose son had been lured by one such woman on the New Year Eve. The woman first befriended the contractor’s son through phone and then lured him to a hotel in Vikas Nagar near Uttarakhand for celebrating the New Year. 

The SP said the woman not only asked the victim to meet her outside the Paonta Sahib gurdwara but also arranged a taxi and booked a hotel to spend the New Year together. The contractor got a call from Anwar about two days later, demanding Rs 20 lakh in lieu and threatened to register a police case against his son if he refused to pay the money.

The deal was struck for Rs 10 lakh and the contractor was directed to bring the money to some secluded place on two occasions, including a bridge at Majra. Anwar failed to collect the money as he suspected that the police were tracking him. He had specially bought a SIM card, which was used merely to call the contractor while the phone remained switched off throughout the day.

The police managed to trace his whereabouts when his cell phone developed a snag and he took it to a mobile repair shop where a SIM card was placed in the cell for a few minutes to check whether the fault had been rectified. This led the police to Anwar’s residence at Bhagwanpur and he was arrested this evening.

A case under Sections 385 and 384 of the Indian Penal Code has been registered and search is on to trace the women involved in this racket.