A 25-year-old youth, identified as Badal, a resident of Kondli village in Delhi, has been arrested by a team of the East District Police for making an extortion call to a jewelry showroom in Mayur Vihar demanding five lakh rupees.
According to Mohan Dass, manager of Alukka Gold Palace, a call was received from an unknown number. The caller, claiming to be part of a criminal gang, demanded the extortion money. The manager filed a complaint at the Ghazipur police station.
Based on technical surveillance, the police set a trap to arrest the culprit. At around 2 pm on Tuesday, the accused was intercepted near Mayur Vihar Phase 3. A keypad mobile, used for making extortion calls, and another mobile, used for taking contact numbers from the internet, were recovered from his possession.
During the investigation, Badal revealed to the police that he was influenced by the videos of criminal gangs that he watched on YouTube and made a plan to extort money from jewelry shops in Mayur Vihar.
He borrowed a keypad phone and SIM from one of his friends and called jewelers in the locality threatening them to part with their money or he would kill them.
The police said they were ascertaining the involvement of the accused with criminal gangs while efforts were on to trace many other jewelers to whom he made such extortion calls.
Over the years, it has been noticed that criminal gangs recruit gullible youth for extortion rackets in Delhi-NCR. The youths are fascinated by gang and gun culture to flaunt on social media.