Lucknow: 5 booked for duping businessman of Rs 50 lakh at VVIP guest house

LUCKNOW: Local police have come across another incident where fraudsters booked a room in the VVIP guest house of UP government to dupe a businessman on the pretext of helping him get a government contract. A few days ago, the STF had also busted a gang which had used another VVIP guest house for duping job aspirants.
Senior officials said that government guest houses are used by conmen to appear genuine while trapping the innocent.
A New Delhi resident had accused a man and four of his aides of attempting to defraud him in the name of facilitating work in the UP government during a meeting with him at the VVIP guest house in Hazratganj.
A senior police official privy to the probe said that they were trying to find out who got the room number 506 booked in the guest house and that he will not be spared.
He said that in the past also, in some other VVIP guest houses in the city, such incidents have taken place.
In the FIR, Shwet Goyal of Delhi said that he was contacted by a few people who asked him to meet them in Lucknow for business purpose. He said on July 31, he reached the Naimisharanya VVIP Guest House opposite Bahukhandi Mantri Awas on Butler Palace Road in Lucknow.
He then reached room no-506 with his cousin, brother and uncle.
"There were four people already present in the room and they told us that one person, named SK Bajpayee, who is an IAS officer posted at the complaint branch in CM Yogi Adityanath's office, will soon come to meet us. The said person arrived after an hour. He said that he has a good rapport with senior government officials and can help us in getting some works allotted directly from the UP government," he alleged.
He said the conversation went for almost an hour. "The imposter called various people in front of us and tried to influence us with his power and connections and then he demanded Rs 50 lakh as an advance. The entire conversation seemed suspicious to me and I asked for his identity. He started diverting the talks related to his identity issue and got charged up during the conversation. He then threatened us and said he is a powerful man and will put us in trouble with his connections as he managed to escape from the scene," Goyal alleged.
ACP, Hazratganj, Akhilesh Singh, said that the FIR under the charges of extortion, criminal intimidation, impersonating as a public servant has been filed against SK Bajpayee and four unidentified persons.