Thaindian News

New Delhi, June 14 (IANS) An impersonator who duped several people, including legislators from the northeast, by claiming to be a central government official was arrested here, police said Thursday. He was earlier booked in seven similar cases.

Sanjay Tiwari, 35, who hails from Faizabad in Uttar Pradesh, was arrested along with his associates Rattan Deep Gupta, 29, from east Delhi’s Mayur Vihar Phase-I Tuesday, a police official said.

Tiwari posed as additional personal secretary in a central government ministry and tried to dupe two legislators from the northeast in the garb of speeding up the release of central monetary grants to them.

He along with his associate was also running two news portals - tiranganews and ujalanews.

“The master fraudster has a past criminal record and was arrested seven times for similar offences of impersonation, cheating and extortion,” said Sanjay Kumar Jain, deputy commissioner of police (crime and railways).

“The impostor had approached several MLAs of the northeast region. In a case in April this year, Tiwari called up two MLAs. He had promised to assist them in processing and fast-tracking their requests for central monetary grants from the ministry. He had demanded ’speed money’ to help them get grants quicker,” said Jain.

“The MLAs got suspicious over his conduct. During their inquiry they found that some conman was trying to dupe them. Then a case was registered,” said Jain.

In 2005 and 2007, Tiwari and his associates, posing as news reporters, extorted money from the drivers of three vehicles carrying cooking gas cylinders in the capital.