Thane Crime: Two held for posing as power firm employees, cheating people of over Rs 19 lakh

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Two persons have been arrested for allegedly cheating people of over Rs 19 lakh by posing as employees of a power company in Mumbra of Maharashtra's Thane district, police said.

The matter came to light when the power company received complaints from consumers that some unidentified men, posing as employees of the firm, had offered to get their power bills reduced and collected money from them, Assistant Commissioner of Police (Kalwa) Venkat Andale said. A dairy owner from Sabegaon was cheated by the accused who offered to reduce the power bill of Rs 68,000 and collected 50 per cent of the amount from him, the official said.

When the payment was not adjusted in the subsequent bill, the victim filed a complaint with the Shil Daighar police and an offence under relevant sections of the IPC was subsequently registered.

The police zeroed in on Rafique Ahmed Shaikh (39) and Abdulla Bilal Shaikh (25), who allegedly collected the details of pendency and approached consumers, offering to get their bill amount reduced and collected money from them and fled, the official said. The duo also issued fake bills to the victims, he said. Nearly 25 power consumers were cheated to the tune of Rs 19,61,000, the official said, adding that further probe is underway.

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