Posing as mediapersons,they extorted money from erring builders

The matter came to light when Kasim,a resident of Old Seema Puri,complained to the police that some persons claiming to be from the media were blackmailing him. They were allegedly asking him to cough up Rs 25,000, failure to comply with which would entail publication of a story on the illegal construction and its subsequent demolition. “The victim gave them Rs 10,000 but they kept asking for more,forcing him to file a complaint,” said S K Jain,DCP Northeast. The accused persons were caught red-handed from the area on Friday.

During an interogation,Simran Gupta — the alleged kingpin of the racket — disclosed that he and his friends ran a local weekly newspaper called ‘Surag Suspense’.

“Pretending to be actual journalists,they would gather information on illegal construction activities in the area. Then they would blackmail the person,stating that they would — otherwise — circulate the story and expose their deeds. Usually,the victim would give in to their demands. Some MCD officials were also involved in the racket,” said Jain.

Five wireless sets,a huge stack of Press ID cards,two handycams,a digital photo camera,mobile phones,a microphone mike,incriminating documents,a computer and CDs were recovered from Gupta. They had been reportedly running the racket for a couple of years.

Simran Gupta has a journalism degree from Jamia University. “Initially he worked in a national newspaper,during which he established contacts in the MCD. He even hired some people to conduct ‘sting operations’,” said Jain.