The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Mimicry artiste, wife arrested

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Friday, Jun 27, 2008
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Mimicry artiste, wife arrested

Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD: Mohd. Rafeeuddin, a mimicry artiste who allegedly extorted nearly Rs. 60 lakh from different persons claiming himself as naxalite leader and his wife Zameerunnisa, were arrested by the police on Thursday.

A Honda City car, gold jewellery weighing 250 grams and Rs. 80,000 were recovered from them, the Commissioner’s Task Force DCP V.B. Kamalasan Reddy told reporters.

Hailing from Jagityal of Karimnagar district, Rafeeuddin was earlier arrested on cheating and extortion charges by the police of Karimnagar and Guntur.

After coming out from jail in January 2007, he shifted to city and bought a bunch of mobile phone SIM cards from retailers without submitting any identity proof. He and Zameerunnisa used to ring up the phone numbers of LIC Development Officers, bank officials, businessmen and politicians collected from telephone directories randomly.

Claiming that he was District Commander of People’s War Group naxalites, he would threaten to kill them if they failed to donate funds to purchase firearms to run the organisation. He would keep a tab on the movements of his targets and call up them frequently leading them to believe that he had a huge network of associates.

If the targets ignored his calls, Rafeeuddin used to collect details of their family members and threaten to kill even their children. On a tip-off, a special team led by SI P. Venkatagiri raided the rented house of the couple at Rahul colony of Azizbagh and arrested them.

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