Nagpur: As the Belgaum suspect denied his involvement in making threat calls to Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, the Nagpur police have decided to record statements of four persons who were contacted by the suspect by the same mobile phone number.
According to Commissioner of Police Amitesh Kumar, police examined the Call Detail Record (CDR) of the mobile number which was used to issue threats to Gadkari. Before and after contacting Gadkari’s office, the suspect also spoke to four persons from the jail. Statements of these persons will be recorded under Section 164 of Code of Criminal Procedure. This will help the police to establish suspect Shreyas alias Tejesh Poojari’s involvement in the case. Jayesh Pujari, a resident of Mangalore, is lodged in Belgaum jail on charges of extortion.
When the police interrogated Pujari on Monday, he flatly denied involvement in the case. The mobile phone was yet to be recovered by the Hindalga jail authorities so far. Pujari was identified by the police on the basis of the phone number which was shared by the caller himself. Similarly, the police also checked the phone number used to dial the BSNL number of Gadkari’s office. The threat calls were received on the BSNL landline of Gadkari’s public relations office on Saturday. The calls were received at 11.25 am, 11.45 am and 12.32 pm on Saturday.
Pujari reportedly told the telephone operator that he was a “D-gang member” and demanded Rs 100 crore ransom from the Minister. He also gave the details of the spot in Karnataka instructing the operator to deliver the parcel consisting of cash. Later, he threatened to kill Gadkari with a bomb, police said. Pujari also gave his mobile phone number to the operator to contact him.
