BENGALURU: In a classic case of fence eating the crop, three policemen attached to the Central Crime Branch have been suspended after it was found that they had allegedly robbed Rs 1 crore demonetised currency from a woman, who was trying to exchange it with new notes.
Assistant Sub-Inspector Hombale Gowda, constables Gangadhar and Narasimhamurthy are the policemen accused of robbing the currency. They are attached to the Homicide and Burglary squad of the CCB. Following a report by DCP (Central) Chandragupta, Police Commissioner T. Suneel Kumar suspended the three policemen, who are absconding.
The alleged incident took place on the night of November 25 in High Grounds police limits. A complaint was filed by Subana N. Mannangi, a BMTC bus conductor and a resident of Vyalikaval Extension in Vijayanagar. He stated that he had taken a home loan of Rs 75 lakh. As he could not pay the EMIs, the bank had issued notice to him about auctioning the property. To save the property, he had approached many people, including a real estate agent, Satyanarayana, who is a resident of Uttarahalli.
"He asked me to bring those who have demonetised currency and he will exchange it with new notes. He also offered me a commission. I approached my acquaintance, Rathna, who told me that her friend, Ragini, had old notes worth Rs 1 crore. We went to BTM Layout to exchange the currency on Nov. 25 afternoon. But as Satyanarayana could not exchange the currency even after waiting for more than one-and-a-half hours, we decided to leave. Meanwhile, we met Venkatesh, who promised to exchange the currency," he said.
The same day, around 8 pm, Subana, Rathna and Ragini went with the demonetised cash to Race Course Road. They met Venkatesh and confirmed that he had new currency. As they were exchanging the cash near Yadava College in Madhavanagar, three men came in a car and told them that they were Seshadripuram police and seized the demonetised cash. All the three immediately went to the Seshadripuram police station, but learnt that it was not the police who had seized the cash. Late in the night, a complaint was filed at the High Grounds police about the incident.
"Initially, it was thought to be an offence committed by a robbery gang. Based on the CCTV footage and the description provided by the complainant, we found that the car belonged to a travel agency in Chamarajpet. When we checked with the agency, it was found that the CCB police regularly booked vehicles from them whenever they went on operation. On the day the offence, the car was booked by the accused policemen. It was found that the accused policemen had not turned up for work that day. We have collected other circumstantial and concrete evidence against the three policemen,” an official said.
DCP Chandragupta had submitted a probe report to the police commissioner, who suspended the three policemen. "More details will be known only after we question the trio," Mr. Kumar said.
