PANAJI
The 'seizure' of Rs 16 lakh cash from a businessman at Dabolim in South Goa by rogue election officials last Sunday was originally meant to be a planned highway heist.
However when the plan went awry, Nitesh Naik, roped in the 'flying squad' to make it look like an official election-related seizure, police investigations have revealed.
Naik, a lower division clerk (LDC) of the electricity department but deployed on election duty in the Information Technology (IT) 'monitoring cell' at the office of the South Goa Collector, stopped the vehicle and lifted the money from Ashok Chaudhury.
It was only when Chaudhury realised he was looted that he chased and caught up with Naik, asking him to report to the Vasco police station. Realising that his initially planned highway heist was going awry, Nitesh then roped in the Dabolim 'flying squad' members of which surprisingly played ball.
Chaudhury, a Ghaziabad businessman but temporarily living in Caranzalem, had picked up the Rs16 lakh from a businessman friend Yashwant Singh Krishnaiah, who owns a granite factory in Sancoale industrial estate and lives in Dabolim.
Later, while driving back home to Caranzalem with the money, Chaudhury was stopped by Nitesh, who claimed to be an IT officer, which is not false, except that it was construed to be 'Income Tax officer'.
He confiscated the money but Chaudhury doubted his credentials as no procedures were followed. He chased and caught up with his looters and asked Nitesh to come to the Vasco police station.
That is when the latter called the Dabolim flying squad and his network of looters widened to include the flying squad in-charge Anirudh Pawar, who is Mormugao municpal engineer.
Verna police had initially recovered Rs 8 lakh on Wednesday -- Rs 4 lakh each from Naik and Pawar. Both have since been suspended by Chandru and were also arrested by the police but are out on bail.
Late on Saturday evening, the police also succeeded in recovering the balance Rs 8 lakh, interestingly from the company owned Krishnaiah who had lent the Rs 16 lakh to the complainant.
According to a Verna police sources connected with the investigations, an accomplice of Nites, Chandan Yadav, who had taken half the loot returned the money to Krishnaiah on suspecting that their plan was going the wrong way.
He rushed to the Sancoale factory of Krishnaiah and returned the entire Rs 8 lakhs, the police source said.
Pursuing Chandan's story, the investigators sent Krishnaiah a summons to join the investigations and on verifying it recovered Rs 8 lakhs from his company's office at Sancoale.
Apart from Nitesh, Pawar and Yadav, the case also names Keshav Khawanekar. The foursome are out on bail.
