Three arrested for extorting from 182 women: Cops
KOLKATA: Kolkata police have arrested three persons, including two members of prominent Kolkata business families, for allegedly blackmailing women after getting into physical relationships with them and making videos of their intimate moments.
Video clips of 182 women in compromising positions have also been recovered from the suspects, a police officer said.
Kolkata police joint commissi oner ( crime) Murlidhar Sharma said more people could be involved in the racket.
“That’s under investigation. There can be more,” Sharma told IANS when asked whether there is a bigger conspiracy or more people were part of the racket.
The accused were presented before a ci t y court, which remanded them in police custody till February 6. The tapes were allegedly recorded by the scions of the two business families over a period of seven years, said Sharma. According to the police, Anish Loharuka’s family owns several hotels, while Aditya Aggarwal’s family runs a popular ethnic wear chain. The two would befriend women, get intimate and develop physical relationships, and record photos and videos of intimate moments. The suspects would then break the relationship. The third arrested person, Kailash Yadav, was employed as a cook of one of the two accused and played the role of the extorter directly by calling up the victims and forcing them to pay money after threatening them that their videos would be leaked on social media. The police started looking into the case after receiving a complaint of cyber crime in November from a woman.
According to the complainant, she initially paid ₹5 lakh after receiving a blackmail call “from the unidentified caller” with some of the video clips, but when he again demanded ₹10 lakh threatening to release the clips online otherwise, she decided to approach the police.
Yadav was nabbed earlier this month for allegedly making telephone calls to blackmail her. Based on his statement, Loharuka and Aggarwal were taken into custody. The police have seized a laptop and sent it for forensic screening.