Bhupalpally: The Kaleshwaram police arrested five former Maoists for their alleged attempt to extort money from two Sarpanches on Saturday. The arrested were Vavilla Janardhan, Puliganu Satish, Beerelli Narasaiah, Pendem Rajendraprasad and Alem Sammaiah. The police also recovered two toy pistols, a car, four gelatin sticks, five mobiles and a bike from them.
SP J Surender Reddy said the police caught them during vehicle checking while they were on their way to Kaleshwaram to collect the money. He said the former Naxalites had threatened the Kaleshwaram Sarpanch on Wednesday to hand over a Rs.50 lakh ‘donation’ to them claiming that the CPI Maoist party demanded the money.
“V Janardhan (50) has been working as the RMP at Bhupalpally town since he surrendered to the police in 2016 after working for almost 27 years. He also worked as the member of the Radical Student union (RSU) before joining the then People’s War Group,” the SP said, stating that he was providing treatment to outlawed Maoists since his surrender.
“Meanwhile, he along with other accomplices planned to extort money in the name of Maoists to make easy money after a meeting at his house on April 22. As a part of this, they tried to take money from both the Kaleshwaram Sarpanch as well as Nagaram Sarpanch,” the SP said.