Police on Friday claimed to have busted an inter-state gang involved in circulation of fake non-judicial stamp papers in Patna and its neighbouring districts, following the arrest of a man.

Police also seized fake non-judicial stamp papers with a face value of over Rs 1.5 lakh during a raid at Sorangpur under the jurisdiction of Ram Krishna Nagar police station in Patna. The arrested person was identified as Natwarlal, a native of Nalanda.

Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP) Manu Maharaaj said acting on a tip off, a police team headed by the station house officer of Ram Krishna Nagar police station Ranjan Kumar conducted a raid at the rented accommodation of Natwarlal and picked him for interrogation.

During interrogation, Natwarlal said the fake non-judicial stamps in different denominations were supplied to him by one Ganesh Kumar, a resident of Lalji Tola in eastern Patna. He was paid Rs 100 as cut money on sale of stamp papers worth Rs 1,000.

Mahaaraj said the gang has its network spread across the country. "The police have gathered vital information about the links of the gang, which I don't want to share with the media at this juncture," he told The Telegraph.

In another operation, the police nabbed three persons - Abhishek Ranjan alias Chiku, Prakash Kumar and Vipul Kumar - for allegedly demanding Rs 5 lakh as extortion money from a medical practitioner Sushma Kumari.

The trio confessed to their crime and said they had procured a SIM card by submitting forged documents of someone called Shambhu Nath. The SIM card was recovered from their possession. The victim had lodged a case with the Kankerbagh police station on December 22.

In yet another operation, a contract killer identified as Jai Prakash alias J.P. Rai was arrested from Anand Bazar in Danapur on Friday. Rai was facing charges of murder, loot and extortion in different police stations in Patna.