India’s Government Railway Police (GRP) Commissioner has ordered an internal inquiry after it was alleged that a group of police officers in Maharashtra state were running a corrupt operation where they shook down gay men for cash with threats of outing them.

According to the allegation railway police officers recruited Ajinkya Shinde, a Marathi speaking aspiring actor, and got him to pose as a gay man in order to entrap gay men using railway station bathrooms.

According to allegations by Shinde’s wife Supriya, the officers told him to target railway station bathrooms at Panvel, Belapur and Kharghar stations and that he could ride the rails for free with impunity.

Shinde was told to loiter at the urinal until he attracted a suspected gay man. He would then lure the man to an isolated place where railway police officers would then take over.

‘The officer] told Ajinkya that his part would involve just attracting the target and leading him to an isolated place, after which the GRP officials would take over,’ she told Mid-Day.com.

‘The policemen used to let my husband go and extort money from the target by threatening to expose their sexual leanings to their family and friends … The GRP officials offered decent money for this work to my husband.’

Supriya said that when other railway police officers learned of the lucrative scam they asked Shinde to work for them as well.

However the scheme backfired when one of the victims refused to pay up and lodged an official complaint with Panvel GRP after he was allegedly robbed by one of the officers.

‘[The victim] informed senior officers about this and then registered a case with the Panvel GRP for assault and robbery,’ Supriya said.

‘[One of the officers] resolved the matter in the police station itself and released my husband.’

However the victim also wrote to GRP Commissioner Dr Ravinder Singal to lodge a formal complaint.

Supriya said that the officers involved in the scam first told her husband to lay low and keep off the railways but then called him into the police station on 3 March where they arrested him.

‘The case is obviously fake because a constable was with Ajinkya when the alleged robbery took place and if my husband was involved in a crime, he could have caught him right then. No money was recovered from Ajinkya,’ Supriya told Mid-Day.com.

‘So many officers are involved in this crime and they had lured my husband with money and even a job with the police if he helped them in the racket. These same officers are now threatening that they will not leave us alone and will arrest Ajinkya in another case if we don’t keep our mouths shut.’

GRP Commissioner Dr Ravinder Singal says he has launched an inquiry but has fears corrupt railway police will close ranks to try to stymie the investigation.

‘I … came to know that there are many officers from GRP who are involved in this matter, but I didn’t get any officer’s name,’ Dr Singal said, ‘They settled all this at the lower levels and it never reached me.’

‘We are conducting an inquiry into the involvement of the officers and will punish anyone who is found guilty.’