Eight persons have been arrested for allegedly running an illegal parking lot in Gurugram`s upscale Galleria Market and extorting money from vehicle owners, police said on Tuesday. The racket was running for about two months in Gurugram. The accused were allegedly extorting money from the car and two-wheeler owners who would park their vehicles in vacant public places, the police said.
According to the officials, a joint team of Chief Minister Flying Squad and the District Town Planner (Enforcement) Gurugram, conducted a raid on illegal parking which was running without permission on the service road in front of the market. Printed receipts from POS electronic machines that were being handed out to the vehicle owners in the fake parking lots were recovered by the raiding team on the spot.
Police arrested eight men, Paramjit, Mulayam Kumar, Ashok Kumar, Rakesh Kumar, Mahesh Kumar, Omkesh Singh, Sanjeev Singh and Sanjay Kumar.
The men used to extort parking charges at the rate of Rs 20 per hour from four-wheelers and Rs 10 per hour from two-wheelers. Six POS electronic machines were also recovered from their possession.
"The men used to run the parking lots even if they did not have any contract for the purpose from the concerned authority. They were extorting money from cars and two-wheeler drivers. We are trying to ascertain who was taking the parking money. We are investigating the issue," a police officer told IANS.
An FIR has been registered under IPC sections 384 (extortion) and 34 (common intention) against the criminals at the Sector-29 police station.
