The police on Friday, 29 November, conducted a raid in a hotel in Nayapalli area and arrested two staffers on charges of installing hidden cameras and blackmailing a guest.
On receiving a complaint lodged by a woman in Nayapalli Police Station, the police conducted a raid in the hotel located at IRC Village on 28 November.
The complaint stated that there were CCTV cameras installed in the hotel’s washroom and the said people blackmailed for money.
The complaint was registered by a woman who had stayed in the hotel on 5 November to celebrate her birthday with a friend. The woman had received a call from an unknown number and the caller said he was in possession of a video which showed her and the friend in some private moments during their stay in the hotel.
The video was reportedly shot via a hidden camera which was installed in the room without the occupants’ knowledge. The accused demanded an amount of Rs 50,000 from them and threatened to leak the video on social media if they didn’t do so.
The girl warned the anonymous caller of police action, but the blackmailer did not back-off. Thus, the two planned to lay a trap and catch the caller.
The complainant called the accused to a place in CRP Square to give the demanded money and arrested the accused with the help of the police. The accused arrested are Babuna Behera and Sheikh Nisam, who are the housekeeping staff at OYO-run Sai Arya Residency.
They have also been accused of digging out numbers from the hotel register entries, narrow down their target, record their videos and blackmail them later, according to reports from India Today.
Nayapalli Police are carrying out a further investigation into the case.
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