Bengaluru: Two police constables were arrested on Sunday for allegedly robbing a city advocate of Rs. 8 lakh in cash.
The police have identified the arrested as Mayura, a head constable, and Raghava Kumar, a police constable attached to Girinagar police station. The constables reportedly took advantage of the confusion surrounding demonetisation to rob the advocate.
On Saturday night, the advocate, Sukanya, was travelling from her residence in Padmanabhanagar to Majestic in an autorickshaw, reportedly, with a bag of Rs. 8 lakh in cash to hand over to a colleague.
In her complaint to the police, she said the cash was in Rs. 2,000 notes and she had withdrawn them from bank.
According to the complaint, Head constable Mayura and Constable Raghava Kumar, attached to Girinagar police station, stopped the auto near Seetha Circle for a random check. When they found the bag of cash, they allegedly escorted the advocate to their patrolling vehicle under the pretext of conducting an enquiry.
There was a third person in the vehicle who was not an officer. The man, later identified as Krishnamurthy, reportedly teamed up with the constables for this robbery.
When the constables failed to turn up for duty on Sunday, a special team, under the direction of Deputy Commissioner of Police Sharanappa S.D., tracked them and arrested them. The police also arrested Krishnamurthy for abetting the constables. “Of Rs. 8 lakh, we recovered Rs. 1.3 lakh from Raghava Kumar and Rs. 5.4 lakh from Krishnamurthy, while efforts are on to recover the rest of the money,” a senior police officer said.
Both the constables have been suspended and the Assistant Commissioner of Police has been directed to investigate the case.
