One arrested for extortion attempt

PUNE: The Pune Cantonment police on Tuesday arrested a 39-year-old editor of a local news daily for allegedly attempting to extort money from the owner of a CD shop by threatening to make a false complaint against him.
A complaint in this regard has been lodged by Vijay Gidwani. The police said the suspect Ruben Manuel, a resident of Kondhwa, has been charged under section 384 (extortion) of the Indian Penal Code.He was produced before the court on Wednesday and remanded to police custody till March 6.
Sub-inspector Sandip Ghuge said Gidwani runs a CD shop on M G Road. A month ago, the suspect had gone to Gidwani's shop and told him that he was the editor of a local news daily. Manuel alleged that Gidwani was selling pirated CDs and demanded money or else he would publish the story. Gidwani refused to pay," he said.
Ghuge said Manuel later published the story in his daily. "After that, he visited Gidwani's shop and picked up CDs worth around Rs 4,000 without paying for them," he said.
On Tuesday, Manuel again went to Gidwani's shop and threatened to lodge a complaint against him under The Copyright Act, 1957. Gidwani approached the police out of frustration and lodged a complaint against Manuel. "We verified the allegations against Manuel with the witnesses and then took action against him," Ghuge said.