THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Vigilance and Anti-corruption Bureau officials on Tuesday arrested four men from Venjaramoodu while they were extorting money from a headmaster of a government-aided school to withdraw the complaints they had filed with the government against him.
The arrested have been identified as Prasad, Biju Thankappan, Allesh and Rakesh Roshan. The accused were nabbed while they were receiving Rs two lakh from the headmaster of St Joseph HS, Piravom.
Biju is currently the PTA president of St Joseph HS, while Allesh is a PTA executive member. Prasad was a former PTA executive member, while Rakesh worked in a bike showroom as a manager.
The complainant in the case was set to retire from service on March 31.
Prasad had filed phoney complaints against him alleging irregularities in the school funds. Biju and Allesh called the headmaster to Prasad's house on the pretext of conducting a settlement talk.
The Vigilance said the trio made the headmaster believe that they have to meet an education department officer in Thiruvananthapuram to solve the matter.
They took him to Thiruvananthapuram on February 27 and introduced him to a man, who claimed to be a senior officer in the education department. The man, Rakesh, was a manager in a bike showroom pretending to be a government official.
Rakesh convinced the headmaster that his retirement benefits will be blocked if action is taken on the complaint.
Prasad initially took Rs 30,000 from the headmaster as travel expenses and bribed the officer. Later, the group threatened the headmaster and asked him to pay Rs 15 lakh to Rakesh to settle the matter. When he said he did not have that much money with him, they directed him to pay Rs five lakh.
The headmaster informed the Vigilance about the incident and the Vigilance sleuths set a trap for the quartet. The four were arrested while they were taking Rs two lakh from the headmaster at Venjaramoodu.
Those arrested were produced before Muvattupuzha court.