New Delhi: Five men have been arrested for allegedly posing as police officers and extorting Rs 1.5 lakh from six students at gunpoint by threatening to implicate them in a case.
The accused — Manpreet Singh alias Twinkle, Junaid, Wasid alias Monty Carle, Sarabjeet alias Prince and Kuldeep Singh alias Anshu — worked as property dealers.
Police said on Dec 11, they received a PCR call about a robbery at a building in Hari Nagar. The students told cops they lived in a rented accommodation in Subhash Nagar. One of them said around 9.40pm, four people arrived to conduct a ‘raid’, introducing themselves as police officers. They accused the students of carrying out “illegal activities” in their rented flat. Alleging the students were running a fake call centre and duping people, the accused thrashed them, police said.
Deputy commissioner of police (West) Vichitra Veer said the accused robbed the students of about Rs 1.5 lakh. During the investigation, four of the accused — Manpreet, Junaid, Wasid and Kuldeep Singh — were identified and arrested. Based on information provided by them, the fifth accused, Sarabjeet, was held in Tilak Nagar.
Police said the accused confessed to their role. About Rs 1 lakh, a pistol, a live cartridge and a car was recovered from them.
The accused told police they lived in the same locality where the students resided in Subhash Nagar and heard rumours that they were running a fake call centre to fund their lifestyle. They noticed that the students carried costly phones and laptops with them. Seeing their spending habits, the accused suspected they were running some illegal activities and started tracking their movements.
“The accused believed the students might be involved in illegal activities and would be vulnerable to extortion. They thought the students would not report the incident to the police. However, the students came from economically strong families and were graduates,” an officer said.
