Police on Thursday arrested a post-graduate student of Osmania University and his associate, who allegedly extorted money from two persons claiming themselves as CPI-ML Praja Pratighatana activists. Three receipt books which were in the name of CPI-ML and three mobile phones were recovered from the arrested persons, N. Venkata Mallu, 28, and V. Veeraiah, 21. The Commissioner's Task Force DCP, Ch. Ramchander, said in a release that Mallu was pursuing M.A. (Public Administration) course. Veeraiah completed B.Ed. programme and was waiting to appear for teacher selection test. Mallu and Veeraiah hail from Yepur and Bopparam villages respectively of Atmakur mandal in Nalgonda district. Mallu was actively associated with the student wing affiliated to CPI-ML Praja Pratighatana and was State Committee member of the latter for past one year. The duo allegedly extorted Rs. 50,000 from a person at Himayathnagar and Rs. 1 lakh from another person in Ramanthapur a month ago. For past 10 days, they were threatening a builder to pay Rs. 3 lakh towards party fund. “Mallu used to go to the builder, who is into construction business in Khammam, put the builder to his leader, G. Goverdhan, CPI-ML Praja Pratighatana president, through his mobile phone,” the police said. Goverdhan used to demand money from the builder and threaten the latter of dire consequences if failed to comply with. Alerted by the builder, the TF (North) team spread out a dragnet and caught the accused. They were being handed over to Banjara Hills police station for further investigation.
