Team Herald
PANJIM: There is “incriminating” evidence that Google Pay has become the standard or even “official” mode of payment of bribes to the men in khaki.
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While some sections of the Goa Police and their friends and well-wishers outside the police desperate to push the GPay scam under the carpet, the upright North Goa SP Nidhin Valsan has taken it upon himself to rid the police force of this acute embarrassment.
After the GPay scam in Agasaim, two cops were suspended for extorting money from a couple in Miramar.
They have been found having used GPay to accept the payment. Both the Agasaim and Panjim Police case details have been sent to Vigilance for further inquiry.
On Monday, the Goa Police suspended Santosh Chavan, a constable attached to the Agasaim Police Station for his purported involvement in a case of harassment, and extortion and for accepting bribes of Rs 5,000 through GPay, a mobile payment service from a Calangute-based car owner.
While the Goa Police was conducting an inquiry into the Agasaim bribe case, last week, two police constables attached to Control Room of Goa Police were suspended for allegedly extorting money from a couple sitting in a secluded place at Miramar beach. Now, inquiry has revealed that these constables also demanded a bribe of Rs 20,000, settled it for Rs 5,000 and collected the bribe amount through GPay.
SP North Goa Nidhin Valsan said, “Two different cases of accepting money by constables are being inquired. While the alleged amount is the same. Both have used GPay to accept it.”
In the Miramar case, the constable duo Rupesh Malsure and Dharmendra Wadkar were found prima facie guilty in an internal inquiry. They were suspended by the North Goa Superintendent of Police Nidhin Valsan after the couple complained that the duo was blackmailed and extorted money in March.
With Goa Police conducting further departmental inquiry in the matter, the SP Vigilance is looking into both the cases of constables involved accepting bribes through GPay.
It may be recalled that O Heraldo had exposed the case of alleged harassment, extortion, and accepting bribes through GPay by the police attached to the Agasaim Police Station after jeep owner and victim of extortion Nitesh Vengurlekar gave the incriminating screenshot of a Google Pay receipt of an alleged bribe of Rs 5,000. Nitesh was allegedly instructed to transfer a bribe amount to an employee of a garage located opposite the police station by constable Santosh Chavan.
