The Nilgiri police busted a racket of frauds and arrested three persons. They were identified as Purosattam Babu (47) of Jamuna village, Duma Behera (40) of Tartari village under Mayurbhanj district and Ranjan Behera (33) of Guhalia under Nilgiri bock in Baleswar district.
They were forwarded to court where their bail pleas were rejected and they were remanded in jail custody. The gang, about three weeks ago, hatched a conspiracy to befool and loot Rs4 lakh from one Ajit Jena (35) of Gambhari village under Singla police station. While looting the money they had terrorised Jena at gun point.
The police, besides recovering Rs92,000 in cash, also seized a bike from their possessions. During investigation, the police could learn that victim Jena had gone to Jamuna village to buy a Hanuman coin on March 4.
But the trio instead of giving him the coin, which they never had, robbed him of Rs4 lakh. It may be noted that cheating over Hanuman coin is rampant in the tribal belts of Mayurbhanj and Baleswar districts where a belief is there that the coin has a mysterious power and can do any miracle.
Hence, there is a mad rush for it. After four days of the incident, Jena lodged an FIR with police alleging that he was looted. The case was registered under Section 395 of IPC. The police seized the cash from house of Purosattam.