07 August,2011 07:58 AM IST | | Sayed Roshan
A special squad comprising the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Zone 9 Pratap Dighavkar and a team of officers from Santacruz police station busted a betting racket operating out of a Santracruz house and recovered Rs 3.26 lakh. Four bookies were caught red handed placing bets during an ongoing horse race in Bengaluru on Friday.
The police hope that this raid may help them crack down on bigger rackets operating in the country.u00a0u00a0The accused identified as Bharat Chenai (57), Rajesh Loladia (44), Devendra Shah (40) and Sameer Mukund Master (59) were arrested as they placed bets while watching a horse race, the Bangalore Summer Season 2011, on television in Chenai's residence in Maheshwari Darshan building on S V Road, Santacruz (west). According to the police, Chenai operated the racket over the phone from his house.
Equipment including a laptop, a printer, and 14 mobile phones, worth Rs 1.46 lakh was also seized. According to the Dighavkar, the accused used specialised software in their laptops that the Mumbai cyber crime cell is having a hard time to crack. The hard disk of the laptop will be sent to forensic experts in Bengaluru and later, Hyderabad.
"The software will reveal the connections of these bookies. There is a possibility that they were part of a country wide betting racket," said a police officer, who spoke to Sunday MiD DAY on the condition of anonymity, as he is not authorised to speak to the media. "The betting was conducted over the phone. Their customers are now being tracked down," he added. The accused have been arrested under Section 4/5 of the Gambling Act of the Indian Penal Code.
