Kolkata: Cop held for Bangladeshi trader extortion

KOLKATA: The detective department has arrested a Kolkata Police driver, Biswanath Biswas (34), who is now employed with Taltala police station, for allegedly extorting money in the name of checking passport of a Bangladeshi businessman. The incident took place barely a kilometre from Sealdah station. The businessman had come to Kolkata for treating colon cancer.
The anti-rowdy section carried out the arrest after going through hours of CCTV footages.A complaint in this respect was received through email from the victim, Bangladeshi trader Mohd Mosharraf Hossain (47), to commissioner Anuj Sharma and joint CP (crime) Murlidhar Sharma.
Cops said as per the complaint, Hossain had come to the Kolkata on October 15. He later went to Mumbai for a fourday treatment.
He had returned to the city on October 20 and had set out early on October 21 morning from his Mirza Ghalib Street hotel to catch the Gede Local that leaves Sealdah at 4.20am.
In his mail, the complainant said when the cab reached Moulali Crossing around 3am, a cop in uniform stopped him. He asked for his name and then his passport. He finally asked the victim as many dollars as he had on him. When he said he was carrying Bangladeshi currency — worth around Rs 20,000 in Indian currency — the cop demanded the same. He threatened to implicate the trader if he did not do as instructed, the email stated.
Cops said Hossain claimed the accused was not wearing a cap but a police van stood a little ahead. He said the age of this person could be around 50 years. “We have arrested the accused and will produce him in court. A separate departmental enquiry has been ordered. We are ascertaining if others were involved,” said a senior Lalbazar official.
Police had initially suspected some reserve force personnel only to realize that they were no longer on duty at the spot.
The police then went through logs of all neighbouring police stations before realizing that the accused, hailing from north 24 Parganas, was the accused. “We believe he must have been extorting money for the past several several weeks,” said an investigating officer.