Police bust bogus call centre operating from Navi Mumbai mall and targeting people in US; FIR against 23 persons

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Police in Navi Mumbai has busted a bogus call centre operating from a mall in Vashi area and registered a First Information Report (FIR) against 23 people, including its owner and manager.

The accused posed as representatives of US companies and sold medicines like Viagra and Cialis to people there, PTI reported. They obtained details of credit/debit cards of the people and cheated them, the official from Vashi police station said.

Several gadgets, besides hard discs and electrical accessories worth Rs 3.97 lakh were recovered following a raid at the call centre on Saturday, the report said.

The accused made outbound calls using VCdial/Nextiva software. They made the calls through gateway bypass and VOIP, the official said, adding the accused were caught red-handed while indulging in such acts.

The call centre owner allegedly purchased the data of people in the US from a person based at Malad in neighbouring Mumbai and the employees used pseudo names to call up those people to sell the drugs.

The drug sale proceeds were credited into the account of an Indian company at a bank branch in the Kharghar area, the official said.

An FIR was registered against 23 people under Indian Penal Code sections 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (cheating) and 34 (common intention) as well as provisions of the Information Technology Act and the Indian Telegraph Act, the official said.

On Saturday, the Navi Mumbai police also busted a similar bogus call centre operating from a mall in the Nerul area and registered a case against 13 persons in that connection.

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In May this year, Mumbai police busted a fake call centre from where a gang duped people across India on the pretext of offering cheap tour and travel packages.

The police arrested 12 people in the matter and seized 28 laptops and 40 mobile phones from the bogus call centre. The fake call center was operating from a commercial building at Andheri's Marol area.

According to the police, "The victims are from various countries which includes Canada. All accused are well educated and young." "The police are yet to ascertain the number of victims in the case and the money they lost to the gang," the official added.