Berhampur: Police Sunday arrested a man on charge of demanding Rs 2 lakh from a retired bank manager claiming himself to be a Maoist here in Ganjam district. The accused was identified as Uma Shankar while the victim was identified as Prafulla Sahu of Bidyanagar.
Police registered a case based on a complaint by Prafulla Sahu and produced Shankar in court. He was later remanded in judicial custody after his bail plea was rejected. Shankar has several cases of extortion and other crimes in his name at several police stations, police revealed.
According to sources, Prafulla was constructing a new house near engineering school Chhak. Behera also resided in the same colony in a rented house. Shankar collected details of Prafulla and hatched a plan to extort money from him claiming himself to be a Maoist.
As per the plan, he wrote a letter to Prafulla April 15, 2016 demanding Rs 2 lakh introducing himself as a Maoist. Identifying himself as Krishna, he sent the letter to Prafulla with ‘CPIM Lal Salaam’. Being superscribed on it. Shankar threatened Prafulla he was a target of Maoists and warned him with dire consequences if he failed to deposit the amount. Shankar threatened Prafulla to keep the money in a packet and send it through a government bus. He also sought some medicines along with the amount.
Prafulla remained silent for some time and finally approached police and narrated his ordeal.
Police began an investigation and asked Prafulla to receive the calls of Shankar. There was no lead in the case as there was no evidence except for the letter. Shankar called Prafulla one day and the police traced the mobile number. Police caught Shankar and took him for interrogation. Shankar to the crime.
This wasn’t the first letter of Shankar, police said. He had earlier written several such fake letters and extorted money from many people. Shankar hailed from Mohana and had a fair idea of Maoists, police added. “Investigations are on to find if Shankar has any connection with Maoists,” police said. PNN