Bhubaneswar: With the police raising the heat on betting rackets in big cities during top ticket tournaments like IPL cricket, the racketeers seem to have relocated their base to small towns as was evident from the arrest of the kingpin of a syndicate running the illegal show from Berhampur in Odisha.
Though the racket basically operates online with the network covering every corner of the world, the operators need to pitch the tent at a place having a good pool of local clientele. If India’s business capital Mumbai, national capital New Delhi and eastern hub Kolkata served just right for the racket to flourish some time ago, the cyber crime branch activism pushed the gambling dons to innocuous places.
According to sources, with the changing scenario, the mastermind of a betting syndicate Dinesh Rathi opened the shop in Berhampur in the run-up to IPL at Abu Dhabi last year. A week into the tournament, he was back in the business.
But his plan burst as the local police rounded up some of its key operatives in October. They included Lalie Achari, a close aide of Rathi.
After Achari spilled the beans, the police came to know that the racket operated through the bookies in other cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Dubai. It led the police to extend its investigation parameters and finally traced Rathi in Kolkata.
Police sources said Rathi was nabbed in Kolkata on Thursday and produced before the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate court which granted his transit remand and custody to Berhampur police till Tuesday.
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