3 ‘RTI activists’ extort ₹4L from Thane builder, held
THANE: The Thane anti-extortion cell (AEC) on Thursday arrested three men who allegedly posed as right-to-information (RTI) activists and threatened a builder for money and property.
The accused, identified as Vasant Joshi,46, Kalpesh Joshi, 29, and Vinod Joshi,35, have been remanded in police custody after being produced in court.
The trio, who used RTI applications to find out about the builder’s illegal projects, threatened to kill him if he did not pay them money or hand over of some of his flats. Senior police inspector Pradeep Sharma said, “The complainant said he was threatened and abused for ₹30 lakh and also told to hand over three flats from a project of his.”
After the builder paid them ₹4.7 lakh, he decided to approach the police for help. The Thane AEC set up a trap when the builder agreed to pay more money to them in Dombivli.
Rajkumar Kothmire, a police Inspector, said, “The accused have cheated many people in the past and we are trying to find out how much money was involved. Vasant is history-sheeter and has several cases against him, including murder charges,” a police officer said.
On Friday evening, police said dozens of people from Thane approached the anti-extortion cell with similar complaints against the accused. Earlier, police had arrested other fake RTI activists, including two former corporators, in connection with extortion cases.