Caller, who threatened a Minister in Bihar, identified

The Patna police claimed to have identified the caller, who had allegedly threatened to eliminate PHED Minister Ashwini Kumar Choubey and his family over telephone on Monday night. Two other suspects have also been detained for interrogation.

The Patna police on Wednesday claimed to have identified the caller, who had allegedly threatened to eliminate Public Health and Engineering Department (PHED) Minister Ashwini Kumar Choubey and his family over telephone on Monday night. Two other suspects have also been detained for interrogation.

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Deputy Superintendent of Police (Sachivalaya) Rajesh Kumar, who is investigating the case, said that the caller had been identified as Sadanand Mandal, a resident of Bhagalpur. "The antecedents of Mandal are being verified," he said.

A police team would soon be dispatched for Bhagalpur to ascertain criminal antecedents of the caller, who had allegedly also threatened with dire consequences to a teacher of Bhagalpur for his failure to pay extortion money.

"Though the teacher, M S Choudhary, had lodged a complaint against Mandal, no action was taken by the concerned police," the police officer said, adding that two other suspects have also been taken into custody from Bhagalpur for interrogation. He, however, refused to disclose the names of the detainees.

An FIR was lodged with the Sachivalaya police station on Tuesday on the basis of the statement of the Minister's Personal Secretary, Rajiv. The police swung into action only after the caller made threat calls again on Tuesday morning.

Notably, the caller had introduced himself as Khan Bhai over telephone. The caller had identified himself as Khan Bhai and claimed to be self-styled commander of the outlawed CPI (Maoist).