Betting & hawala rackets are interlinked, say police

JAIPUR: A day after busting an inter-state betting racket and seizing more than Rs 4 crore, Jaipur police on Thursday said the punters, bookies and hawala traders were interlinked. While a bookie loses a bet from his counterpart based in some other city of Rajasthan, he would ensure that his hawala links will deliver the lost amount of money. This syndicated racket used to add people interested in betting over IPL cricket matches through WhatsApp groups created in the name of

Hindu

deities including — Salasar Hanumanji,

Govinddevji

, Khatushyamji and Radhakrishnaji. Not only this, those who were into placing their bets used to term Rs 1 lakh as 1 kg and Rs 1 crore as one chicken.

TOI on Thursday spoke to the senior officers of Jaipur police commissionerate and members of the team who had busted the racket and seized more than Rs 4 crore from a house situated in

Kotwali

police station area. “What we found in this particular case is that all the bookies involved in betting across Rajasthan and some other states were jointly into the betting racket. And most shockingly, the hawala traders were facilitating them in transferring money from one place to another. Suppose a bookie of Sikar loses his bet on a match and loses Rs 1 crore from a bookie based in Jaipur. In this case the bookie from Sikar will call up his hawala men in Jaipur to deliver the money,” Ajay Pal Lamba, additional commissioner of police (crime) told TOI.

Police stated that they had a specific input on hawala money, which was collected from various places through cricket betting. “We have arrested two persons identified as Randhir Singh, a native of Gujarat and Kripal Singh, a native of Ajmer,” he said.

Preliminary investigation suggested that they were into online betting and also placed bets through the WhatsApp group. “In order to mislead the police, they had created WhatsApp groups in the name of Hindu deities,” said an officer.

The arrested members of the racket are associated with the bookies of Rajkot and other parts of Gujarat.

“While placing a bet for Rs 1 lakh, the term was ‘1 kg’ and for Rs 1 crore, it was ‘One chicken’. Our team is also decoding other WhatsApp messages to make further arrests and recovery,” Lamba added.

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