Bengaluru, May 24 (IANS) The Karnataka State Cyber Command on Sunday unearthed a massive “digital arrest” cyber fraud case in which a 74-year-old Bengaluru woman was allegedly cheated of Rs 24 crore by fraudsters posing as officials of central investigation agencies.

The arrested accused were identified as N. Shivanam from Erode in Tamil Nadu, Akkach Mallik from Mumbai in Maharashtra, Palak Bhai Patel and Amit Narendra Patel from Ahmedabad in Gujarat, Om Prakash Rajut from New Delhi, and Gaurav Kumar from Bihar.

An official statement in this regard was issued by Punab Mohanty, IPS, Director General of Police, Cyber Command, Bengaluru.

According to a press note issued by the Karnataka State Cyber Command, the victim, Lakshmi Ramamurthy, a senior citizen from Bengaluru, was trapped by cyber criminals impersonating officers of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

The accused allegedly intimidated and manipulated her into transferring huge sums of money over a period of more than two months.

Police said the victim transferred Rs 24 crore from her ICICI Bank account through 26 transactions into 23 root accounts linked to 10 different banks across the country between February 10 and April 24, 2026.

Officials said the fraudsters attempted to extract more money from the woman even after the massive transfers.

On April 24, she was reportedly preparing to transfer another Rs 3 crore by availing a gold loan. However, alert officials of ICICI Bank informed the Cyber Command unit, following which the police team immediately intervened and prevented the transfer.

The timely intervention helped save Rs 3 crore from reaching the fraudsters.

Following the complaint, the Cyber Command launched an investigation and traced the movement of funds parked in first-tier accounts.

With the assistance of the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCRP), police froze several root accounts and recovered around Rs 4 crore.

In addition, another Rs 1.46 crore was recovered through court orders, taking the total recovered amount to more than Rs 5.46 crore.

During the investigation, police also seized six mobile phones allegedly used in the crime from the arrested accused.

–IANS

mka/pgh