Four fraudsters nabbed for selling rice puller

Hyderabad: Rachakonda police on Tuesday arrested four persons of a five-member gang of fraudsters, who had been cheating gullible people in the name of supplying rice pullers. The arrested accused include P Krishna Reddy, previously a software engineer, R Prakash, V Rajendra Chary and Vel Kumar of Tamil Nadu.

Another accused Abdul Khaleel of Tamil Nadu is still at large. Police said the members of the gang came in touch with each other in search of objects that attract grains of rice but got cheated by others. To make good of their losses, they formed into a gang and began looking for prospective customer interested in rice pulling articles.

Accordingly, Shiv Shankar of Kushaiguda approached them for the rice pullers. The gang lured him saying they have in their possession a Ganesh idol which has the unique quality of attracting rice grains which is worth Rs 3,000 crore in international market.

The gang collected Rs 12 lakh in cash, while Shiv Shankar spentanother Rs 10 lakh towards travel, accommodation and other expenses incurred by the gang. As the accused failed to deliver him the promised goods, he lodged a complaint following which the gang gathered at Turkayamjal with a Ganesh idol claiming it to be a rice puller.

However, acting on a tip off, police raided the place and arrested four accused, while the kingpin Abdul Khaleel managed to give the slip to the police.

A wooden box containing a dubious rice puller, Rs 3.2 lakh in cash, one car, and documents related to a house site purchased by one of the accused with the crime proceeds and other incriminating material were seized by the police.