Man held for extracting money by picking up brawl with car drivers

PUNE: Days after he was conned, a Balewadi-based software professional helped the Chatushrungi police arrest the culprit on extortion charges.
About a week ago, 33-year-old Yogesh Giri played a con to extract Rs 22,000 from Shirish Sontakke and was about to trap another person when the complainant reached the spot with the police in tow and got him arrested by picking up a quarrel with him about a week ago near Pimple-Nilakh, 33-year-old Yogesh Giri on Friday had almost trapped one more person.Before Giri could force him to pay the money, Sontakke reached the spot along with the Chatushrungi police and got him arrested. Interestingly, police officials have recovered the cash, forcibly taken off Sontakke, from Giri's possession. He was carrying the cash along with him since October 30. "Giri's wife told us that she had requested her husband to give her Rs 5,000 for the treatment of their daughter. But, Giri did not give her the money," said Pramod Kshirsagar, assistant inspector of the Chatushrungi police station.
On the 'Laxmi Pujan' day (October 30, during Diwali, software engineer Shirish Sontakke, a resident of Balewadi was driving towards Baner in his car for making necessary purchases for performing puja. "When he reached the bridge at Pimple-Nilakh, a black sedan blocked his way," said assistant police inspector Pramod Kshirsagar.
The car driver, who introduced himself as got down and introduced him go Sontakke as Sandip Balwadkar, began quarrelling with Sontakke and asked him to get out of the car and began quarrelling with him. Immediately the public gathered around them. When a crowd gathered, the accused told onlookers to leave as it was between the two drivers. As soon as the people dispersed, he alleged that Sontakke wasn't driving his car properly. "He had to apply brakes and the autorickshaw in the rear bumped into his car. As a result, Due to which the side mirror and the tail light was of his car damaged," Kshirsagar said.
The accused also told Sontakke that he had already informed the police about the accident and they would be reaching the spot soon. He then demanded Rs 35,000 so as to not lodge a from Sontakke for not lodging the police complaint. Eventually, When Sontakke told him that he was not having that much amount with him, the person agreed on Rs 22,000. Sontakke agreed to give him the money and took the person along with him as he was not carrying his ATM card with him. "Sontakke gave him Rs 1,000 and withdrew another Rs 21,000 from an ATM kiosk near his home, the officer and gave to the person," Kshirsagar said.
Sontakke then dropped the accused back to his car but before leaving the spot, he noted the car's license plate number. About three days lager, the complainant came to know that the driver of the same car had attempted to extract money from one Pavan Gupta, who lives in his neighbourhood ing building. However, when Gupta told him he would give him the money only in the presence of police, the accused left the spot.
Police investigations revealed Giri earlier ran was running a food joint in Bhosari that . During the road widening, his joint was demolished and ever since Giri had been jobless, Kshirsagar said.
Road to incarceration
After the incident, Sontakke alerted his friends about the modus and the car number over WhatsApp. got suspected and alerted his friends about the car driver and his modus. He also gave the car number to all of his friends. On Friday morning, his friend Sandip Vijayan called to tell him and told him that he had seen a black car near a crematorium at Baner and the driver was arguing with another. Sontakke immediately alerted the police and his local contact Amol Balwadkar. Along with Balwadkar and the police Sontakked reached the spot to and immediately identify the driver. The police took the suspect Yogesh Giri into custody and recovered Rs 21,000 from him.
The investigations have revealed that Giri had recently purchased the car from his relative. After his food joint was demolished, he was in need of money. "To earn easy money, he had started extracting money by threatening the car drivers," Khirsagar said.