Times News Network
Ludhiana: A 32-year-old sales executive with an automobile company lost Rs 21.88 lakh to cyber criminals, who lured him with the opportunity to make generous profit on online investments.
The victim claimed that he invested Rs 30,000 himself while the accused stole the rest of the money from his bank accounts. The accused transferred the money into at least nine bank accounts.
The victim, Abhishek Sehgal, 32, a resident of Aman Nagar near Jalandhar Bypass, filed a police complaint on Aug 16, 2023, following which the cyber crime police station registered a case under sections 420 (cheating), 120-B (criminal intimidation) of the IPC and Information Technology (IT) Act.
The FIR was lodged against some persons and firms including- One Star metals, Indore, Madhya Pradesh, Skylark properties of Pune, Maharashtra, Shubham Yadav, proprietor of Cokrun flute of Jaipur, Rajasthan, Basmati of Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, Breakspot enterprises of Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, AD enterprises and Anand Kumar of Gurgaon, Zoya plastic and Bhavsar Seema Ganesh Bhai of Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Sunita Patra of Berhampur in Odisha and Masi Rig services of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. They were booked as the accused transferred the money into their bank accounts.
Abhishek Sehgal said that on Aug 13, 2023, he received a message on Telegram from an ID, ‘Ganikaishya.’ The accused offered hotel booking task to earn money from home.
Sehgal explained, “The idea was to book rooms of luxury hotels in advance so that customers looking for rooms would think that the hotel was fully booked. This would present the hotel in good light and enable room booking at a higher price. My task was to book such hotel rooms by making payment and I was supposed to receive the payment back with commission,” he said.
The complainant said that he spent Rs 30,000 in a few days on hotel bookings but did not get anything in return. Meanwhile, he said that he came to know that some money was being transferred from his bank account and credit cards. “I immediately sent emails to the bank concerned, however, they did not respond on time. The accused managed to transfer Rs 21.88 lakh from my accounts. I approached the cyber cell immediately and they launched a probe,” he said.
Inspector Jatinder Singh, SHO, cyber crime police station said that the cyber criminals were suspected to have gained access to the victim’s mobile phone, after which they transferred the money. Police also managed to get Rs 3 lakh in some bank accounts frozen. Further investigation is on.