KRV, Hindu Mahasabha leaders arrested for dacoity, blackmailing senior citizen

MANGALURU: A Karnataka Rakshana Vedike leader and district head of Hindu Mahasabha have been arrested on various charges, including dacoity, extortion and assaulting a senior citizen.
Police said that Srilatha, Mangaluru taluk president of Karnataka Rakshana Vedike, Rajesh Pavithran, district president of the Hindu Mahasabha, and their gang recorded a man’s sexual act with women and threatened to release the video to the media if he did not heed their demand.
Srilatha called the man near Mangala Stadium, Ladyhill, on September 23. Upon the man’s arrival, Srilatha and four unidentified people kidnapped him. The man was locked at the residence of Pavithran in Surathkal.
Police said that the five demanded Rs 5 lakh each to hide the video. As the man refused to budge, the gang assaulted him and fleeced his gold chain weighing 4.5 sovereigns, two gold rings, a watch and Rs 18,000. The man then filed a complaint at Barke police station.
Police recovered the man’s belongings and the memory card which supposedly contains the video.
The accused were booked under various sections of the IPC on Tuesday. They were produced before a court which remanded them in judicial custody. More people are yet to be detained, police said.