New Delhi: The Delhi Police have registered a case against unidentified men who Tuesday allegedly tried to extort Rs 5 crore from a South Delhi businessman by posing as officials of the Enforcement Directorate (ED).
In the plot that appears to be on the lines of the 2013 Bollywood crime thriller Special 26, the group of seven landed at the residence of the businessman in Chhatarpur area Monday night, pretending to carry out an ED raid.
The men threatened to arrest the businessman and demanded money, but he bought time on the ground that he would need to withdraw cash from the bank. The group claiming to be ED officers stayed the entire night at his house.
The businessman, however, got the chance to alert his lawyer about his possible “arrest by the ED” and the plan of the men to take him to a Kotak Mahindra Bank in Hauz Khas area.
When the lawyer arrived at the bank while the businessman was also there with the group of men, he confronted them with the legal aspects of the case and sought their identification cards. This propelled the men to leave the bank hurriedly.
The Enforcement Directorate was informed about the imposters and it sent its team to the bank to investigate the matter. The police were also notified.
The entire chain of events was narrated by the businessman in his statement to the police.
The businessman told the police that four of the seven persons were wearing masks and had identified themselves as part of an ED team investigating a case against him. Three others without masks questioned him by showing him old cheques from his bank account and constantly asked him about withdrawals from his account, before threatening to arrest him unless he was willing to pay Rs 5 crore.
The Delhi Police have filed an FIR against the suspects and seized the vehicles used by them to carry out the “fake” searches.
Sources in the ED told ThePrint that a probe is on to ascertain how the men were able to pick out the particular businessman and whether it was part of a larger plot.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)