Bhubaneswar: Commissionerate Police have arrested two fraudsters who were looting people late at night by introducing themselves as policemen.
A couple of days back, the duo posing as members of the Commissionerate Police’s Special Squad had duped Rs 8,000 from a youth of Lingaraj police station area.
The duo after confronting the youth had asked why he was loitering at such late hours and had collected Rs 8,000 from him towards penalty for the same.
The youth had lodged a complaint at the Lingaraj police station in this regard following which the police had launched an investigation in the matter.
The accused have been identified as Gyana Ranjan Mohanty (62) and Kanhu Charan Sahu (58).
Gyana Ranjan was a retired policeman. He had retired from the Commissionerate Police as an ASI two years back. Kanhu Charan used to assist him. Both used to move in plain clothes to catch their prey.
“A couple of days back a case of loot was registered at Lingaraj police station.Two persons introducing themselves as policemen used to impose fines on people moving in late night. Following the complaint, we launched an investigation and have arrested them from the Lingaraj police station area. Gyana Ranjan had earlier served as a police ASI. We have forwarded them to court after their arrest,” informed Bhubaneswar DCP Uma Shankar Dash.
Since such type of loot is normally seen in Bihar and Telangana, police suspected that the looters could be from outside State.
In order to nab the looters, police moved in plain clothes in the Lingaraj police station area.
As bad luck would have it, the duo caught hold of policemen moving in plain clothes and asked them to pay fine. It was at this time as pre-planned policemen pounced on the duo.
“They used to target people returning from redlight areas. They used to follow people returning from these areas and used to collect fines from them at desolate places. Since Gyana Ranjan had worked with the Commissionerate Police for a long time he was well acquainted with all the areas of the Capital City and its lanes and bylanes,” said the Investigating Officer (IO) of the case.
