Bhubaneswar, Jan 11 (IANS) In a major crackdown, the Commissionerate Police, Bhubaneswar-Cuttack, on Sunday busted an interstate cybercriminal racket operating from the state capital, by arresting 12 accused persons, said Police Commissioner S Dev Datta Singh.

Singh revealed that of these, seven persons belong to Bihar, four hail from Kerala, and one is from Odisha.

“Working on credible information, the Commissionerate Police swiftly acted upon and busted a well-organised interstate cyber fraudsters’ gang, arresting 12 members of the gang. Most of the members of this gang hail from Nalanda district in Bihar,” said Singh.

They had been running the racket in a highly secretive manner for the last few months from the house of Debasish Tripathy, located at Tankapani Road under Badagad police limits in the city. The police identified Debasish Tripathy, Arjun Raj alias Bitu (22), Bijay Kumar (24), and Pankaj Kumar as the masterminds of the gang.

The Police Commissioner further added that the gang, involved in both manual and cyber fraud methods, is infamously known as the Katri Sarai Gang of Bihar.

“Pankaj used to collect the whole Customer database of NAPTOL, MEESHO and other E – Commerce platform sites through his agents engaged at his village and also collect mule bank accounts to run this crime for online transfer of money. The Cyber Fraudsters used to collect the bank account numbers along with the UPI Handles from their agents in Bihar and shared those account numbers/UPI Handles with the victims to deposit/transfer their hard-earned money,” said police sources.

The police also ascertained during the investigation that the accused criminals obtained fake pre-activated SIM cards from different mobile service providers through agents by furnishing fake documents to make phone calls to customers and operate internet and social media platforms. The accused cheated people using three modus operandi, including fake gift voucher winners, the Kerala lottery scam, and fraudulent loan offers.

The accused Tripathy, a web graphics designer, prepared scratch cards, gift vouchers, lucky coupons, offer letters, and Facebook pages for advertising and attracting targeted customers, providing a mobile number as a helpline regarding winning gift vouchers or costly prizes. Subsequently, the letters, along with coupons and phone numbers, were sent to different victims through the post from Kolkata by agents of the accused persons.

After scratching the lucky draw coupon, the victims telephoned the accused, who asked them to pay registration fees ranging from Rs 5,500 to Rs 12,000 to receive the prizes they had allegedly won.

The fraudsters also duped victims of their hard-earned money by floating fake advertisements on Facebook offering loans from Mudra Finance, Indiabulls, and Bajaj Finance. They targeted gullible people through advertisements of the Kerala Lottery on Facebook with helpline numbers. When the victims shared their details on those helpline numbers, gang members from Kerala — Ajay Raj, Santhroo V, Ajit M., and Sarath Sasi — spoke to them in Malayalam and extracted money under various pretexts.

–IANS

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