Ghaziabad district police on Thursday claimed to have busted a gang of extortionists responsible for making threat calls to a local contractor to cough up Rs5 lakh. Police mounted technical surveillance and managed to arrest them. A case has been registered under relevant sections of IPC at Modi Nagar PS. Contractor Shrikant Sharma had fired an employee of his firm. Still smarting under the humiliation, Amit devised a plan as payback. He huddled a band of brigands and called up his former employer to deliver Rs5 lakh to the drop-off point. The caller also threatened his son would be killed if the drop-off point was staked out by police. Sharma went ahead and lodged a complaint with Modi Nagar police about the extortion call.
The investigating officer (IO) placed the phone number under surveillance. The criminals were caught from Hanumanpuri area. Under sustained interrogation they confessed to having made the calls. They have been identified as Rahul, Pramod, Kaluwa and Rakam Singh. A pistol, two live cartridges and two cell phones were recovered from their possession.“Those arrested are notorious criminals from the surrounding area. They have been sent to jail after being remanded in judicial custody by the court,” said Jagdish Sharma, SP (Rural), Ghaziabad.