UP Man Arrested For Impersonating Amit Shah To Scam Ex-MLA

A man was arrested for allegedly impersonating Union Home Minister Amit Shah during several calls to an ex-MLA and promising him an election ticket if he paid him money, police said on Thursday.

Police have arrested Ravindra Maurya in connection with the scam and are looking for his accomplice Shahid.

Superintendent of Police (Rural area) Mukesh Mishra said Shahid and Maurya have been booked under charges of robbery, cheating, and impersonation, as well as under sections of IT Act.

"In Truecaller, it was written in Devnagari 'Grah Mantralaya Delhi, Kendra Sarkaar' (Ankit). This was done by Shahid and Ravindra Maurya. Shahid is on run, while Ravindra Maurya has been arrested. During the investigation, it came to light that Shahid indulged in similar acts of deceits earlier as well," Mr Mishra said.

The case was filed on the complaint of Inspector Vinod Kumar of Nawabganj Police Station.

Mr Mishra said that the gang would call its targets, mostly political leaders and party workers, impersonating Amit Shah and would try to elicit money from them with fake promises of getting them election tickets.

According to police, Maurya had called and spoken to former BJP MLA Kishanlal Rajput (from Barkhera assembly constituency in Pilibhit district) on phone from January 4 to January 20 nine times.

During their probe, police zeroed in on one Ravindra Maurya, a resident of Samooha village under Nawabganj Police Station of Bareilly, and called him to the police station, Mr Mishra said.

When he came to know that he was under police scanner, Maurya broke the SIM, Mr Mishra said. The SIM was later found to have been registered under a man named Harish from his village, he said.

When he was questioned by police, Harish told them that he had purchased the SIM on December 29 last year.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)