Gurugram: 7 arrested for threats to MLAs had links in Pakistan and West Asia

The suspects, who were held two weeks ago, allegedly made extortion phone calls to several legislators in Haryana, Punjab, said police

The special task force (STF) of the Haryana police has apprehended a gang of seven people for their alleged links with fraudsters in Pakistan and West Asian countries, who carried out transactions of ₹2.70 crore through digital hawala, police said on Sunday.

The suspects were arrested from Mumbai and Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarpur, said police. (Sourced)

The suspects — identified as Dulesh Alam, Badre Alam, Amit Yadav, Saddiq Anwar, Sanoj Kumar, Kash Alam, and Ambulesh Alam— who were arrested two weeks ago, had allegedly threatened and made extortion phone calls to legislators in Haryana and Punjab, demanding ₹5 lakh each from the politicians, said police.

Satheesh Balan, deputy inspector general of the STF, said, “The gang collected data of people working as labourers in the Middle East, and contacted them to send money to their respective families with just 1% commission. Transfer charges for currency exchange are higher than 1%, and hence the suspects lured the labourers and later used their accounts.”

Sandeep Dhankhar, deputy superintendent of police (STF), who arrested the seven suspects, said that suspects made phone calls, demanding ransom, to legislators Surender Panwar of Sonipat, Renu Bala of Sadhora, Subhash Gangoli of Safidon, Sanjay Singh of Sohna, and former MLAs of Punjab and New Delhi.

Dulesh and Badre — residents of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, respectively — were arrested from Mumbai; and Amit, Saddiq, Sanoj, and Kash — all natives of Bihar — were arrested from Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarpur district. Meanwhile, Abulesh was brought to Gurugram from Bihar on a production remand, said officials, adding that he was lodged in Bettiah jail in June 2021 in a Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (Pocso) case.

“We found out during investigation that the extortion calls were routed through 10 Pakistani nationals. The gang members lured people from the economically weaker section, and used their bank accounts just for ₹10,000. They also got several SIM cards issued in their names and addresses, and used them to withdraw and transfer money to other bank accounts,” Dhankhar said.

He added that at least 18 virtual numbers were being operated from abroad via the suspects’ cellphone numbers.

The aides have been identified as Iqbal Kaish Alam (Dulesh and Amit’s brother) and Sadiq in the Middle East; Rakesh in Saudi Arabia; and Ali, Nazir, Wasim, Shabbir, Imran, MD Khan and Rafiq in Pakistan. All of them tried to extort money from the politicians in a planned manner by claiming to be local gangsters, and threatened the MLAs over WhatsApp calls.

According to the Gurugram police, the arrested suspects allegedly made the illegal transactions through several bank accounts, of which 727 were only used for foreign transactions, mainly in Pakistan.

Iqbal and Abulesh committed online frauds earlier; and Abulesh trained Dulesh, Amit and Kaish and helped them get in touch with other gang members in Pakistan and the Middle East, said police.

According to Dhankhar, Iqbal lived in Dubai for three years, and according to a WhatsApp chat with Iqbal, Wasim, Ali, and Nazir. At least 867 transactions have been made through the 727 bank accounts in the past eight months, amounting to over ₹2.77 crore. “All these bank accounts were operated by Iqbal, Sadiq, Rakesh, Ali, Nazir, Wasim, Shabbir, Imran, Khan and Rafiq from Pakistan and the Middle East, and have now been seized,” Dhankhar added.