Six individuals were arrested by the Meerpet police for impersonating police officers and extorting money from a rice trader by falsely claiming that his consignment was illegal.The accused were identified as 26-year-old Aekka Sandeep Kumar, a driver from Uppuguda; 35-year-old Devara Shetti Girish, a private employee from Meerpet; 24-year-old Beeram Shiva Reddy, employed at a call centre in Uppal; 30-year-old Rakesh Singh, an auto parts salesman from Uppuguda; 24-year-old Gantala Sai Ram Reddy, a student of Acharya Nagarjuna College in Guntur; and 24-year-old Kakarla Pavan Sai, a customer service executive working in Adibatla. Police said another accused, identified as Anand, is absconding.The accused intercepted a lorry transporting rice near the Patancheru ORR Exit on Monday (May 18, 2026) and introduced themselves as SOT officers before threatening the driver and demanding money.The case came into light following a complaint by Mohammed Afroz, a rice trader, stated that his driver was transporting a rice load to Udgir in Maharashtra when four persons travelling in a car stopped the vehicle around 3.30 a.m. The accused threatened the driver, claiming the rice consignment was illegal, and later demanded ₹6 lakh from the complainant over the phone.The police said the accused eventually agreed to settle the matter for ₹1.6 lakh, following which the complainant transferred ₹80,000 through a UPI app from two different accounts to a mobile number operated by one of the accused.The complainant later suspected that the men were not genuine police officers. When he reached a location near TKR College in Meerpet after being called there by the accused, one of them introduced himself under a false identity before fleeing from the spot. Based on the complaint, the Meerpet police registered a case and initiated a probe.The police seized ₹80,000 in cash, seven mobile phones and a car used in the offence. The arrested accused were produced before the court and remanded to judicial custody, while efforts are underway to trace the absconding accused, Anand.Investigators said the prime accused, Sandeep Kumar, was also involved in several previous cheating and Essential Commodities Act cases registered in Telangana. Published - May 20, 2026 12:11 pm IST