Naveen security beefed up after threat letter

An anonymous letter received at Naveen Niwas, the residence of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, indicating a conspiracy to eliminate him, prompted Odis-ha police to strengthen security at strategic locations in the city on Thursday.

The security was tightened after the Home department asked DG of Police, Director of Intelligence and Commissioner of Police to inquire into the matter thoroughly and take appropriate action.Special Secretary Santosh Bala had also advised to assess the security of the Chief Minister at his residence and Secretariat as well as during jour-ney to various functions and initiate appropriate measures.

The handwritten letter in English claimed some contract killers have been engaged to kill the Chief Minister and the professional criminals equipped with latest weapons like AK 47 and semi automatic pistols have been following him.The letter writer mentioned a list of 17 cars in which, he claimed, the contract killers are following the Chief Minister. The vehicle numbers indicated four were from West Bengal, two each from Chhattisgarh and Punjab, one each from Delhi, Haryana, Maharashtra and Sikkim and the rest from Odisha.“The criminals can attack you anytime. Please be aware that the criminals are constantly fol-lowing you. Two cars with Odi-sha registration numbers will be used by the contract killers to kill you,” read the letter dated January 4.

Stating that the mastermind lives in Nagpur, the anonymous letter also mentioned the numbers of his car and therefore the vehicle during which the weapons are brought t o O d i s h a . “The letter is insignificant intrinsically threats are often received from anonymous sources. Still, we are inquiring to find out from where it has been dis-patched and the person behind it,” said a senior police official.In 2018, a murder accused serving sentence in Bilaspur Central Jail in Chhattisgarh had written a letter to Naveen demanding extortion money of `50 crore and threatening him with dire consequences if he fails to pay. The man with 40-odd cases pending against him was latter found to be a psychopath.