Using royalty papers of MP, mafia stealing sand from Nagpur district

 

 

With the arrest of a man from Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh, Nagpur police on Friday claimed to have busted an inter-state racket indulged in providing bogus royalty papers for transportation of illegally excavated sand.

“The sand mafia were cheating the state exchequer by using bogus papers and smoothly operating their illegal business,” said Commissioner of Police (CP) Amitesh Kumar. He added that Nagpur based beneficiaries of the racket would be identified very soon.

CP Kumar informed the reporters that Rahul Khanna was arrested by the Crime Branch from Bhopal after receiving inputs from a local informer. Before going to Bhopal to nab Khanna, an offence under Section 420, 465, 466, 467, 468, 471 and 34 of IPC was registered at Sadar police station on January 19. The complainant in the case is - Santosh Baburao Gaikwad (33), a resident of Friends Colony.

According to CP Kumar, Gaikwad demonstrated modus-operandi of the racket before the police. He had transferred Rs 9,900 to Khanna from PhonePe app for providing royalty papers and transport permit for sand excavated from a sand ghat located at Narsinghpur district of Madhya Pradesh.

On the demand of Gaikwad, Khanna had prepared the papers and sent to Gaikwad on WhatsApp. The Crime Branch officials are interrogating him to ascertain the names of sand smugglers of Nagpur city.

Elaborating on the modus-operandi of the racket, the CP said that the Nagpur-based sand smugglers were illegally excavating sand from Nagpur district. They were using the bogus royalty papers generated by Khanna to smoothly transport the stolen sand. Along with Nagpur district, the sand-mafia of Wardha, Yavatmal, Bhandara and Chandrapur were also in touch with Khanna, the police learnt.