High-profile sex racket busted

Pune, Aug 3 : Officials of the Social Security Cell on Tuesday night busted a high-profile sex racket and arrested a couple and two small-time TV actresses who chose to be a part of the flesh trade to earn an extra buck.

The arrested couple has been identified as husband-wife duo of Dinesh and Smita Dhiwar. The two actresses had worked in several Hindi serials as junior artists.

The officials said the couple, which was running an independent agency for providing junior artists to TV serials in Mumbai, had kept the two actresses at a city hotel, and were charging Rs 50,000 for two hours from their prospective clients.

“One of the arrested actresses told us that she has acted in serials like Sathiya, Sasural Simran Ka and Tarak Mehta Ka Ulta Chasma,” Police Inspector Bhanupratap Barge of SSC said. “We received information on Tuesday night that Dhiwars had kept the actresses in a city hotel to do sex business. One of our police officials contacted the couple and expressed his desire to seek their service.”

Barge said that Smita instructed the officer that she would take Rs 50,000 for a two-hour service and asked him to deposit Rs 10,000 into her husband’s account. “As per her instructions, we deposited Rs 10,000 into the said account and on Tuesday night sent a decoy customer to the hotel in Shivajinagar where the actresses were kept,” Barge said.

A trap was laid near the hotel and after the decoy signalled the officials, they stormed into the room and arrested the couple and the actresses. “Investigations revealed that the couple, which provides small-time artists to serials, is also involved activities related to the casting couch, and we are investigating the case further,” Barge said.  “We have booked them under relevant sections of Protection of Immoral Trafficking Act (PITA) and they have been remanded in police custody till August 6.”