Indiabulls blackmail: 'Kingpin' held in Lucknow

GURUGRAM: The purported kingpin of a racket which allegedly tried to extract crores from Indiabulls Housing Finance was arrested by a Gurugram police team in Lucknow last Thursday.
Mani Ram Panday (58) was arrested just before he was to board a flight and was carrying around Rs 40 lakh in cash, a police officer said. The leads came from Pandey's arrested accomplice Vikash Shekhar, who spilled the beans on the others. While checking his phone, investigators found many 'petitions' against Indiabulls and other corporates in the names of different people from various cities and towns.
Police said Panday and his son Kislay are advocates by profession. They run a law firm in Delhi - Managium Juris LLP. Kislay is said to have fled from the country. Records show there are at least 4 FIRs against Kislay and Mani Ram filed between the years 2002 and 2011 for offences such as cheating, fraud, extortion, blackmail, issuing threats and offences under the Arms Act.
On June 10, Indiabulls said in a press statement that a racket of blackmailers had been trying to extort money from Indiabulls over the last two months by threatening to write to various government departments, alleging it has siphoned off Rs 55,000 crore. The racket demanded Rs 10 crore from the company.
On June 4, the chief general manager of Indiabulls, Ashok Sehrawat, filed a complaint at Udyog Vihar police station stating he had received a call from an unknown person, who had told him that if he wanted to save the reputation of his company, he should pay him Rs 10 crore, in two instalments.