The Commissionerate police have busted a gold fraud racket and arrested five people of the gang. Manhunt is on to nab another one, said Twin City Commissioner of Police Dr RP Sharma here on Saturday. Acting on a tipoff, the police conducted raids at many places in the city a few days back and arrested five culprits — mastermind Himansu Mohanty alias Bubu (39), Rabi Barik alias Raju (34) and Sivram Pattnaik alias Tuna (35) and Batakrushna Pradhan (45) and Hadibandhu Reddy (45). They all belong to Ganjam district.
While Himansu posed himself as a senior Customs official, other four culprits managed to loot persons by portraying themselves as his subordinate officials. Police seized cash of Rs21 lakh, 200 fake gold biscuits and two luxury cars from their possession. The members of the racket sold fake gold to people by misrepresenting themselves as members of the Customs department, the Commissioner told mediapersons.
Sources said the racket has swindled more than Rs 42 lakh by selling fake gold. They used to make deals by showing original gold, and once the deal was done, they fled after taking advance from businessmen. According to the Commissioner, on March 25, one Sambit Kumar Sahoo of Banamalipur under the laxmisagar police station had lodged a complaint with the police alleging that some unknown persons contacted him for selling of gold seized by the Customs department and took away a sum of Rs 28 lakh from him by giving duplicate gold biscuits.
“During the course of investigation it is ascertained that a group of cheats of Ganjam district are involved in the case. We arrested the four culprits and seized Rs 20.72 lakh from their possession,” added the Commissioner. He said the culprits have said that they committed such crime having been inspired by the Bollywood movie Special 26 in which people posed themselves as Customs department officials and looted people.