For diverting Army canteen food

Hyderabad: The Army ex-servicemen and civilians including four retired army personnel were arrested by the Rachakonda Police on Tuesday.Because the accused army members were involved in diverting subsidized goods meant for defence personnel to the open market.The police identified the suspects as S Srinivas (50) a resident of Suryanarayana Colony in Alwal, Atla Kantha Rao (46) of Neredmet, E Laxmaiah (44) from Balaji Nagar in Alwal, B Varuganti (63) of Yapral, M Srinivasulu (44) from Boduppal, G Veera Basker Reddy (41) from Jawaharnagar and B Devidas (26) from Venkatapuram. Kantha Rao, Laxmaiah, Varuganti and Srinivasulu are retired army personnel."The ex-servicemen purchased various items, including electronic goods, from the CSD and sold them to Srinivas. For this, they were paid a commission of 22 percent", police said.The purchased items were stored in a private warehouse at Madhura Nagar in Neredmet and based on demand, were sold in Begum Bazaar and Secunderabad markets at higher prices."They rented a warehouse for Rs 5,000 for storing the items. They then established contacts with various businessmen in Begum Bazaar and Secunderabad markets to sell the goods", police said.Based on a tip-off, the police caught the suspects while they were loading the items from one CSD grocery into an auto trolley and seized 129 cartons of items, worth Rs 5 lakh, besides 15 CSD Canteen smart cards, one auto-trolley and nearly Rs 1 lakh in cash.