PDS racket busted: 4 held, rice worth Rs 11 lakh seized

HYDERABAD: Four persons who were illegally transporting PDS rice from Telangana to Maharashtra were arrested and 500 quintals of rice worth Rs 11 lakh was seized on Wednesday. A Task Force team of Ramagundam police along with Kalva Srirampur police laid a trap at Zaffarkhanpet and intercepted a two-member gang.
“We got information that the accused collected PDS rice from different villages in two mini vans and loading it into a truck near Zaffarkhanpet. We arrested two offenders, P Ramesh of Motlapally village and B Mahesh of Zaffarkhanpet,” Ramagundam police commissioner V Satyanarayana said.
Another team of Ramagundam police, comprising Task Force team and Jaipur police station, intercepted a truck at Tekumatla X Roads near Jaipur and arrested two persons, Pradeep Sanwane amd Narendra Sahari of Madhya Pradesh. Three others offenders — B Sampath Kumar of Sultanabad, Firdous of Nagpur and P Vasu of Warangal — managed to give the slip to police. “The gang members procured PDS rice from beneficiaries and through some fair price shop dealers by paying up to Rs 8 per kilo ,” the commissioner said.
The gang members were selling the subsidy rice procured from Telangana in Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh for Rs 15 a kilo. “The accused confessed that they have been purchasing a quintal of PDS rice for about Rs 1,000 from interior villages in Peddapalli, Mancherial, Bellampally, Kagaznagar, Asifabad mandals and selling it in Maharashtra for about Rs 2,500. The gangs keep sentries at entry point of villages while procuring rice to keep a watch on police movement. While transporting, they use a pilot vehicle to alert about cops,” the commissioner said.
Civil supplies commissioner Akun Sabharwal said they have registered separate cases pertaining to PDS rice seizure and, after investigation, appropriate legal action would be initiated.