Betting racket for Lanka, India match busted

The special squad of the Nagpur police crime branch, busted a racket of bookies, allegedly involved in betting for the cricket test match between India and Sri Lanka.

Three of the five accused have been arrested while the other two remained untraceable.

Sources said that members of the special squad were patrolling areas under the jurisdiction of the Lakadganj police station on Saturday at around 2 pm when they came across five people engaged in betting.

The accused have been identified as Mohammed Kamal Jangir 37, Neeraj Wadhaliya 34, Vishal Shukla 25, V Joshi 18 and Shailesh Shastri.

A quick search of the spot revealed that the accused were in possession of Rs 5,000, a colour television, a laptop, three line boxes, 33 mobile phones, one printer, 19 compact discs and cassettes, two calculators and some related literature. The total value of the seized materials is more than Rs 1.35 lakh. Police immediately arrested Jangir, Wadhaliya and Shukla, while Joshi and Shahstri fled from the scene.

They have not been traced as yet. Meanwhile, Lakadganj police have registered offences under relevant sections of the law against all the five accused. As investigation into the matter progresses, police are probing the accused’s links to those arrested in betting related cases from the city in the recent past. Police is trying to focus on the possibility that these five accused might be an smaller sect of a bigger racket.