BHOPAL: Lawrence Bishnoi gang operatives in India and abroad are using detailed information available online on various government portals to identify wealthy targets for money extortion.
An interrogation of three operatives arrested in February and March in connection with a recent Rs 10 crore extortion threat to a Madhya Pradesh businessman revealed that information from various government portals, like those for GST and Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA) such as project details, promoters and business turnover are extracted to identify targets.
Additionally, the gang members are also doing detailed scanning of social media pages of prospective targets, to dig as much information they can about the targets.
"The detailed information helps the gang members to create more fear in the minds of the targets, as the targets feel the callers have access to their inner circles and information," a senior police officer privy to the ongoing probe told TNIE on Thursday.
He added that every bit of information scraped from social media and government databases are used while making extortion demands via WhatsApp, particularly in the name of Harry Boxer, who is believed to be operating from abroad.
After identifying the targets, the gang’s key operatives, including Harry Boxer and Ritik Boxer, are hiring greenhorns to terrorise the targets.
19-year-old Manish Jangid is one among the many school and college dropouts from Rajasthan to be inducted as a greenhorn.
Jangid was arrested in MP’s Ashoknagar district on February 28, before he could hurl petrol bombs at the house of a targeted businessman.
A Class X dropout, Jangid hails from a poor family in Jaipur and was working at a grocery store. He was pulled towards the criminal world after he saw snippets of the Boxers' lavish lifestyle on social media. He then got in touch with the gang’s key members through Instagram and was assigned to terrorize targets in Ashoknagar and later Indore, but was arrested in Ashoknagar only.
Currently in Indore police’s custody on two days remand, Jangid has told the interrogators that there are many teenagers and youngsters from Rajasthan who are being sent by Harry and Ritik boxer to terrorise targets in multiple states.
"Questioning of two more men, Dinesh Suthar and Pawan Sharma, who hail from Bikaner (Rajasthan) and Bhind (MP), arrested following Jangid’s arrest in Ashoknagar, has further revealed that the gang is particularly hiring teenagers in Rajasthan, who are aged between 15 and 17 years and have no criminal records," an MP police officer said.
He stated the strategic assignment of minors is to ensure that, in case the operative is arrested, it would be comparatively easy to get them out on bail from correction/reform homes. Also, as they don’t know much about the gang, the cops won’t get much information from the youths, he added.
"A total sum of around Rs 1.5 lakh was transferred to Jangid during his stay in Ashoknagar by the gang members for getting a second-hand motorcycle and other purposes. The sum was transferred from multiple locations in India, using public payment kiosks to limit the possibility of police being able to speedily track those who transferred money," the police officer said.
Interestingly, the high-profile extortion threat by the gang members to Jaipur’s G Club owner in 2023 (one of the cases in which Ritik Boxer is currently lodged at Ajmer high security jail) and firing outside the club, too involved a minor who came in contact with gang members through another juvenile offender during his stay at a juvenile correction home.
The arrested men’s interrogation and associated investigation have also revealed that the highly secure Signal messaging app was being particularly used by the first and second layer of gang members, including Harry Boxer to communicate with each other.
Digital evidence (audio and video) seized by the MP police so far from the three arrested men in Ashoknagar district, have revealed that not only was Harry Boxer in constant touch with them, but there is also a strong possibility of Ritik Boxer being in touch with operatives on the ground from behind the bars at the high-security Ajmer jail.
Harry Boxer was was reportedly detained last month in the US immigration and customs enforcement-ICE Agency in California following extortion threats to Bollywood biggies.
"Both Harry and Ritik had trained 19-year-old Manish Jangid about how to make petrol bombs, through voice and video calls, for terrorizing the extortion target in Ashoknagar-MP. Ashoknagar police are now waiting for an order from the district court to question Ritik Boxer, who is lodged in Ajmer high security jail. Additionally, the call detail records (CDR) of Dinesh Suthar who is among the arrested trio, has revealed that he was in constant touch with someone possibly at a jail in Rajasthan and the SIM used to operate the phone in that jail, was actually obtained in the name of someone in Haryana," informed sources claimed.
According to Ashoknagar district police superintendent Rajiv Mishra, "It’s a multi-layered extortion racket. While three arrests have been made already in the case, a reward of Rs 10,000 has been declared on the arrest of the gang’s key member Pradip Shukla, who represents the second layer of the racket, after Harry Boxer and Ritik Boxer. Efforts are also underway to arrest another absconding gang member, Durgesh Soni. Their arrests will further help the police in digging deeper into the racket."