6 self-styled Robin Hoods held

The Deccan Gymkhana police have arrested six persons for forcing people to donate money for distribution of relief material among the poor.u00a0The group allegedly threatened people with dire consequences if they refused to make a donation.

The police swung into action on Saturday and caught two of the accused demanding money from an office on Prabhat Road. The action came after one of the employees secretly informed the police.u00a0The area had been seeing several such incidents for the past several days. Four to five people would arrive in a car and enter one of the several offices in the area and demand charity for buying blankets for the homeless, wheelchairs for accident victims and medicines for people living with AIDS.u00a0

If their demand was turned down, the accused would issue threats and somehow manage to extort money from a few hapless people.u00a0Fed up with this, residents finally discussed the issue with senior police officials, who then directed the Deccan police to respond immediately to any complaint of this nature.u00a0

According to Police Inspector (Crime) S P Patil, on Saturday three of the accused had entered a laboratory in Lane 2 on Prabhat Road and demanded money for people living in slum areas.u00a0"They had also visited the same office the day before and extorted Rs 2,500 from the firm's employees. One of the employees telephoned us, and we reached the spot and caught the offenders," he said.u00a0

Rajesh Nana Shinde (32), Sanjay Dattatray Samal (32) and Rakesh Devidas Waghmare (24) were immediately arrested by the police. All three are residents of Ganj Peth, where Waghmare lives in Lohiyanagar and the two others in Timber Market.u00a0

Upon interrogation, it was revealed that the three were members of the Hindavi Swaraj Pratishthan near Mahatma Phule Wada.u00a0The police then made three more arrests later in the day, after getting more information from the three arrested.u00a0

"A total of four different cases under Sections 385 and 34 of the IPC have been registered," said Patil.u00a0

"People should immediately contact the police in case ofu00a0any such incident," the officer added.