Team Herald
PANJIM: The Porvorim Police on Saturday arrested three persons, including, two women for allegedly operating inter-State extortion racket on pretext of providing escort service.
The police arrested Candolim-based taxi driver Deepak Salgaonkar (37), Babita Upadhyay (28) from Mumbai and another woman accomplice from West Bengal, following a complaint by two tourists –Sagar Ansari and Shoaib Sadiq, both hailing from Punjab.
As per the complaint, the two tourists called the women they contacted through Escort Service website to their hotel rooms at Porvorim.
Extortion for escort service leads a cabbie & two women to be escorted to the police station
The complainant stated the women were called to the room after ‘fixing their services’ for Rs 10,000. According to the complainant, the women came to the hotel on Friday afternoon and assaulted and threatened them and made them to transfer cash Rs 20,000, in different accounts of the accused persons, which the complainant did, thereby committed robbery. When the men started shouting for help, both the women fled from the spot in a taxi.
The Porvorim Police have registered the case against the three accused under Sections 309 (4) read with 3 (5) of BNS 2023. PSI Arun Shirodkar is conducting further investigations under the guidance of Porvorim PI Rahul Parab.