Daijiworld News Network - Mangalore (GA)

Mangalore, Aug 31: Bunder police led by inspector Vinay Gaonkar have arrested two persons who extorted Rs 12.5 lac from a MCC official after raiding the house of the latter in the guise of lokayukta officials.

The arrested have been identified as Kiran (33), a resident of Ashoknagar and Nitesh alias Neetu (30) of Bejai.  While Kiran owns a garage in the city, Nitesh is dealer of second hand vehicles.  Along with that both of them were also working as brokers for securing various licences from Mangalore City Corporation

In the present case, they said to have masterminded the extortion of Rs 12.5 lac from Manjunath, an assistant town planning officer (ATPO) of MCC, 10 days ago.  Three unidentified persons came to Manjunath's house in the early morning some days ago.  They introduced themselves as lokayukta officials from Bangalore and said that they had come to raid his house following reports that, he had amassed wealth from unknown and illegal sources.

Shocked by this, Manjunath called his friend and colleague Shivraj to his house.  He also called Kiran whom he knew since the latter had worked as broker in many projects to him.  After reaching his house, Kiran intervened and talked with the unidentified persons.  The result of the talk was that they agreed to drop all cases against Manjunath if he paid them Rs 12.5 lac.  Accordingly, Manjunath paid them the said amount of money after which they left the house.

It was only after a couple of days later that Manjunath and Shivraj suspected the originality of the persons who came to former's house.  They also had some doubts on Kiran who made a deal with them.  They immediately filed a complaint with Bunder police.

The police after going through the complaint took Kiran to their custody for enquiry.  During the subsequent investigation, he said to have spilt beans.  As per the information provided by him, police arrested Nitesh.  It was later known that both of them were close to Manjunath and were aware about earnings of the later.  They also knew about the sources from where Manjunath minted money.  So they hatched a plan to blackmail and extort money from him.  Hence they contacted three of their acquaintances from Bangalore who came here and did the rest of the job.  The police are now trying to nab these 3 persons.

Meanwhile, the fake raid has brought to light the amount of corruption that has been circling in MCC.  If Manjunath could pay Rs 12.5 lac at once, there is no doubt that he has income from illegal and unknown sources.  Moreover, if he was not guilty, he would not have paid them or would have contacted the police immediately.  It is therefore very clear that he has amassed wealth by illegal sources and Kiran and Nitesh knew about it very well.  Now it is the high time that the original lokayukta gets into action and clears the entire matter and even the officials.