20 October,2021 07:25 AM IST | Mumbai | Samiullah Khan
Representation pic
The Charkop police have arrested six men who allegedly worked as agents for a Dubai-based businessman, who conned people in India by luring them to invest large sums of money in forex trading, promising large returns. According to the police, the scam was unearthed by a 47-year-old Charkop resident, who had invested Rs 1.75 lakh and was promised Rs 1.5 lakh return every day. The police suspect hundreds of people may have been cheated of lakhs of rupees similarly.
The complainant, a Forex trader, told the police in his statement that in March he had got an SMS offering him good returns on investment. After a few days he accepted and invested about Rs 1.75 lakh between March and May. He had deposited the amount in a multinational bank's current account at its Malad branch.
However, after a few days when he began calling the agent to ask for returns, the accused did not answer his calls. Finding this suspicious, he wrote to the Charkop police. The police officers said during their probe, the account holder claimed that he had opened it for the agent.
The police found that the agent was being paid Rs 90,000 to open a current account in someone else's name by a man residing in Dubai, who ran a call centre for the same. The police did not disclose the mastermind's name and are in the process of contacting the authorities in Dubai regarding him.
Further interrogation revealed the Dubai call centre accused had several agents in various states in India, who were offered about R90,000 each to open current accounts in various banks.
These agents used to target the poor and needy people and open accounts in various banks with their documents and also send them to the mastermind in Dubai with welcome kits (including fresh SIM card, pass book, cheque book, debit cards).
"We have caught 6 accused from Surat and Mumbai. They are between 32 years and 35 years old and were identified as Sunil Ruwala, Yeshwant Yadav, Zameer Shaikh, Imran Shaikh, Tejpal Singh and Sayyed Yaqoob Ali," said a police officer.
"So far around 45 fake accounts have been disclosed and we have frozen all of them. They have R20 lakh in them. Two similar cases are registered at Charkop police station. The same accused are wanted by the Manickpur police. These could be connected. The accused might have committed similar crimes across India," said another other officer.
A case under sections 419, 420 of IPC and various sections of IT Act including section 66 was registered. "Under the guidance of DCP Vishal Thakur, police inspector JJ Bhople and his team began the investigation and they arrested six agents so far from Mumbai and Gujarat and are looking for more," said Senior Inspector Manohar Shinde from Charkop police station.
