Sleuths of the Commissioner's Task Force busted a suspected hawala racket, which allegedly had links to Maharashtra, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. They arrested a six-member gang and seized ₹1.36 crore from their possession.
“The accused were organising money transactions in guise of exporting chilli to Malaysia from Andhra Pradesh. A few more accused are absconding. We are also probing the elections angle to it,” said Police Commissioner Ch. Dwaraka Tirumala Rao.
Addressing a press conference here on Tuesday, he said one Abhinav Reddy, who was in export business in Hyderabad, had appointed Vasupalli Nagaraju and Reddypalli Kishore alias Nani in Vijayawada to look after his business. They checked into a hotel in the city.
Nani, who hatched a plan to steal the unaccounted money, allegedly roped in Ravindra, V. Dasu, P. Bhavanishankar, Chitluri Harshavardhan and a juvenile. The accused were all natives of Mylavaram in Krishna district and Visakhapatnam. Posing as task force police, Harshavardhan, Bhavanishankar, Dasu and the juvenile reportedly intercepted Nagaraju's vehicle and took away the cash in Two Town area, on February 26. The gang threatened Nani, who was in the same vehicle. Later, the fake police raided the hotel room and seized some amount. Ravindra reportedly posed as task force inspector in the offence.Following a complaint, the police registered a case and rounded up the gang members. Abhinav, who claimed to be an exporter and owned some companies at Malaysia and Singapore, could not show any records for the seized amount, the Police Commissioner said.
Investigation officers identified that money was transferred to some accounts in Mumbai and Hyderabad. Nagaraju and Ravindra, were engineering graduates. Ravindra was involved in cricket betting, gambling and other cases earlier, Mr. Tirumala Rao said. “We suspect that more accused are involved in the racket and teams will be sent to Telangana and Maharashtra for further investigation. Information will be given to Enforcement Directorate and Commercial Taxes officials on the seizure,” the Commissioner said adding that a dacoity case was registered. Police are probing the genuineness of the companies run by Mr. Abhinav and the names of the persons who made the transactions at different places, said the city police chief. DCPs B. Rajakumari and Ch.Venkata Appala Naidu, Additional DCPs Shaik Nawab Jaan and K.V. Srinivasa Rao were present.
