Hyderabad: In yet another instance of the growing menace of the so-called ‘village development committees‘ (VDCs), Adilabad police have booked cases against four persons for allegedly resorting to extortion.In Ankoli village of Adilabad Rural, VDC members on Sunday organised an auction for permitting the sale of toddy and an unlicensed liquor shop in the village. In the illegal auction, the VDC members received 3 lakh for permitting a toddy shop and 3.90 lakh for an unlicensed liquor shop to be set up.With the Adilabad district police administration directing local police to take stern action against the illegally operating VDCs, which are resorting to extortions, a case was booked against four persons, Kanaka Ramanayya, Erram Prabhakar, Erram Ashok, and Etikala Bhumanna. “We understand that there were more persons involved in this and will bring in their names also into the case once they are identified,” an officer at the Adilabad Rural police station told TOI on Monday. Cases were booked on Sunday under the Section 308 clause B of the BNS, which might get the guilty punishment of up to five years. Police said that as of now, the cases were booked, and after due investigation, those named would be arrested and prosecuted as per the law.Earlier, cases had been registered in Boath, Ichoda, Jainath, and Bela police stations against the so-called VDCs for imposing their rules in the village and permitting shops in bidding and auction. The Adilabad police on Friday said five cases have been registered so far against VDCs in Bela, Jainath, Boath, and Ichoda police station limits. The cases involve VDCs attempting to resolve civil disputes and extorting money from tractor owners transporting sand.On April 30, a VDC member, Bhuma Reddy, was booked in Jainath for extortion.In April, the Goud community in Tallarampur in Nizamabad district had rebelled against the VDC, which demanded that they pay a certain amount of money for tapping toddy. The community, while refusing to pay, said hardly anyone was tapping toddy but also pointed out that the trees were on their own land and questioned why they had to pay money to the VDC. In retaliation, the VDC allegedly asked other villagers not to ‘cooperate’ with the Goud community and have no dealings with them.Some supporters of the VDC members then approached police, saying that the charges of excommunicating the Goud community were false.