KATHMANDU: Police have held three members of Oppressor Gang, which was involved in collecting hefty amounts of money from businessmen, manpower and real estate agents as well as people working for several organisations for the past one year.

A team from Metropolitan Police Crime Division (MPCD) Hanumandhoka, under the command of Inspector Somendra Singh Rathore, held Raju Lama (30) of Rasuwa, Pratap Basnet (29) of Samakhushi and Anand KC (27) of Kalimati.

According to SSP Rana Bahadur Chand of the MPCD, the gang used a number of mobile phones to call up individuals and organisations for money. "The latest number is 9849430841.

They called a particular person with a complete plan and sought a huge ransom, which started from Rs 1 million. They issued threats for the purpose," SSP Chand added. "This is one of the greatest successes for Nepal Police. We have got a lot of information from the three.

We hope to arrest other members of the gang too," Chand told The Himalayan Times today.

"The gang has been a big headache for businessmen, persons working for organisations and those with a good deal of money.

The gang members directly called up these people and asked them for money. If they refused to provide the amount, they would go as far as killing them or holding their family members hostage," said Inspector Rathore.

"Having been informed about the gang, we detained two offenders last night. We held the third one this morning. According to their statement, they have already spent the money and three more males are in the group," Rathore added.

According to the preliminary investigation of the police, the gang has victimised JB Shahi of Dakshinkali Manpower, manpower agent Pasang Sherpa, real estate dealer Tara Nath Subedi, Nanda Raj Rai of Everest Associates Pvt Ltd, Bharat Giri of Pinnacle Overseas and Naresh Prasad Shah of Talent Overseas.

Shyam Raj Subedi of DS Employment Services, Prem Chaulagai and Mahendra Prasai of New Pathivara Placement, Yum Bahadur KC of Lucky Overseas, Ram Krishna Awasthi of Cosmos Nepal Human Research are among other victims.