Gujarat ATS arrests 5 people for trying to extort ₹8 crore from retired IPS officer

The accused have been booked under sections 389 (putting a person in fear of accusation of offence in order to commit extortion) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code

Five people have been arrested for blackmailing and trying to extort ₹8 crore from a retired Indian Police Service officer by circulating a false affidavit to claim he raped a woman, the Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad said on Monday.

For representational purposes only. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

The ATS swung into action after the woman’s affidavit, claiming that the retired IPS officer raped her at his residence in Chandkheda area of Ahmedabad, went viral on social media, according to Gujarat ATS superintendent of police Sunil Joshi.

The accused have been identified as mastermind GK Prajapati, his aides Haresh Jadav and Mahendra Parmar and Gandhinagar-based journalists Ashutosh Pandya and Kartik Jani

According to the affidavit signed by the 33-year-old married woman at Pethapur police station of Gandhinagar in January this year against one Ismail Malek, the former cop raped her twice in the guise of helping her with a criminal case registered against her brother.

The accused have been booked under sections 389 (putting a person in fear of accusation of offence in order to commit extortion) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code. All five were handed over to Sector 7 police in Gandhinagar for further investigation.

Prajapati, along with Jadav and Parmar, hatched a conspiracy to extort money from the retired IPS officer and convinced the woman to sign the affidavit, according to Joshi. They allegedly wrote the name of the former cop without the woman’s knowledge.

After preparing the affidavit, in which it was claimed that the woman was raped by the former police officer at his residence, the trio first tried to approach him through middlemen and also through other officers to extort ₹8 crore, the ATS official added.