The West Region Cyber Police of Mumbai on Friday arrested three individuals, including a BTech student, for allegedly duping a businessman of Rs 15 lakh. During interrogation, the accused revealed that they used to contact several people, collect their documents, and open bank accounts in their names. According to the police, they offered Rs 10,000 for opening a savings account and up to Rs 15,000 for opening a current account. The trio has been accused of cheating people under the pretext of investing in online share trading.
As per information shared by the police, the arrested accused have been identified as Vipul Patne (28), a resident of Nagpur, along with Shivam Prasad (26) and Anmol Shahi (20), both hailing from Chhattisgarh. Police officials said that Anmol Shahi is a BTech student in Chhattisgarh.
The matter came to light after the complainant lodged an FIR at the Cyber Police Station on 5th April. The complainant informed the police that the accused had lured him into investing in online share trading. They provided him with a login ID and password, using which he accessed a virtual account. The accused further sent him a link to download an app and instructed him to carry out trading activities through it. The complainant was asked to transfer funds into various bank accounts to purchase shares. Following their instructions, he transferred around Rs 15 lakh, out of which over Rs 4.5 lakh was deposited into Patne’s account.
During investigation, the police first arrested Vipul Patne. Based on his interrogation, Shivam Prasad and Anmol Shahi were also taken into custody. Police sources revealed that Prasad and Shahi played an active role in opening the bank accounts used in the fraud. Authorities also seized chequebooks and ATM cards of bank accounts opened under 25 different names. In addition, 15 SIM cards, three mobile phones, Aadhaar cards, PAN cards, and other documents were recovered from their possession.
A senior police official stated that during the probe it was found that several of the bank accounts used in the fraud had already been flagged with 39 complaints on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal.