Two real estate agents held for extortion in Mancherial

Two real estate agents were arrested on Thursday on charges of extortion posing as extremists

Mancherial: Two real estate agents were arrested on Thursday on charges of extortion posing as extremists. Two air guns were seized from them.

Ramagundam Police Commissioner Rema Rajeshwari said the accused persons, Medi Venkatesh, from Itikyala village in Luxettipet mandal and Arendula Rajesh, from Peddampet village in Hajipur mandal, were detained when they tried to escape on a motorbike upon noticing a police party while CCC Naspur Sub-Inspector and team were on patrol at Thollavagu in the morning.

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On being interrogated, Venkatesh and Rajesh confessed to committing the offence to overcome losses incurred in the real estate business.

They had procured two air guns from a store in Hyderabad and threatened to kill Kanthaiah, a retired coal miner in Naspur if he failed to pay a ransom of Rs 30 lakh in February.

The two had called the coal miner and demanded the ransom claiming themselves to be members of a banned Maoist band moving in the Tiryani forests.

They then dumped the guns on the premises of Kanthaiah’s house to terrorise him. Venkatesh was booked in six crimes reported in Hajipur and Mancherial police stations since 2016.

The Commissioner commended CCC Naspur Inspector T Sanjeev Kumar, Sub-Inspector M Ravi Kumar, constables K Srinivas, Irshad, R Sridhar and Devender for the arrest.