Around 1 pm on July 21, 75-year-old Rasik Modi went to the Himmatnagar Main Branch of Axis Bank in Sabarkantha district seeking a gold loan of Rs 30 lakh. He had withdrawn 25 tolas (291.595 grams) of gold jewellery worth Rs 40.82 lakh as collateral from his locker in another bank earlier in the day. Nidhi Shah, the bank officer whom Modi met, found it odd and reported it to the head, branch operations, Ankit Chauhan.
“Usually you don’t need so much money at one time… so this raised questions in my mind. I made him sit down and asked him about the loan. At first he hesitated, but then he said that police were on his phone and that they had asked him to get the loan,” said Chauhan.
Suspecting that he had fallen victim to a cyber fraud, Chauhan asked for his phone and saw a man on the screen on a video call “whose face was blurred”, and he called the police.
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A man impersonating an officer of the Mumbai Police had been on a video call with Modi for over three days, holding him “hostage”, as he told him that he needed the money for an investigation into a money laundering case. The alleged cyber criminals knew that he had just Rs 2 lakh in fixed deposits and thus asked him to withdraw the gold.
In a video statement, Modi said that he was told that his Aadhaar card data had been leaked and used in the fraud. “They said I had engaged in money laundering for Naresh Goyal, who I believe was the owner of some airline. They said that I had given a commission for a Rs 20 lakh fraud. In reality, I don’t even know this person. They showed me a photo and asked if I knew the person, but I didn’t know him. They then asked me when I had last travelled to Mumbai, and I said I hadn’t been there for 13 years.”
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They threatened me for three days from Sunday to Wednesday, said Modi. “The video call used to be on all the time. When we slept at night, the video would continue to be on and we must never cut the call. They would have meetings at any random time and both of us had to sit in on those meetings,” he said.
This incident is among the few wherein alert bankers, finance consultants and relatives averted a crime. Data from Gujarat’s Cyber Centre of Excellence (CcoE) shows 531 cases of digital arrests so far this year in which victims collectively lost over Rs 37.14 crore. In many cases, the police found that scamsters used the Jet Airways founder Naresh Goyal alibi to trap victims.
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Under ‘digital arrest’ for 3 months, doctor lost Rs 20 crore
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is investigating a case from Gandhinagar where the victim is a 75-year-old gynaecologist who was kept hostage on video for more than three months (103 days) at the end of which she lost Rs 19.24 crore in guise of verification of her properties. The alleged video call lasted from March 15 to June 26.
She withdrew her Fixed Deposit (FD), sold her gold, house, shares and also took a loan against gold in the locker, apart from transferring over Rs 19 crore cash to the criminals. An FIR was lodged by the Gujarat cybercrime cell before the central agency took over the case.
Bankers join hands with police
The cooperation between the Gujarat Police and various financial institutions, mainly banks, has been ongoing for several years, but awareness among employees as well as citizens has been growing gradually, though very slowly, say police officers. Deputy Chief Minister Harsh Sanghavi on July 22 felicitated some bank employees who had successfully flagged potential cyber frauds before they could be executed. The Deputy CM suggested constituting a committee comprising representatives from government departments, Gujarat Police, RBI, banking fraternity and other law enforcement agencies to develop a coordinated roadmap and recommend appropriate measures for effectively preventing and curbing cyber-enabled financial crimes across the state.
Assistant Commissioner of Police Hardik Makadia of the Cybercrime Branch of Ahmedabad City Police is on a WhatsApp group of bank nodal officers. “I tell them that if any senior citizen comes to their bank to do an RTGS (Real Time Gross Settlement) withdrawal of more than a certain amount, inform us,” he says.
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However, the results have been mixed, said ACP Makadia. “While one bank employee saved Rs 4.5 crore of multiple customers by alerting the police on time, in another instance a customer lost Rs 7 crore (Rs3.5 crore each from two banks) and we were told that the bank couldn’t verify fraud and so they didn’t inform the police.”
“We tell them that if there is a false flag, it is the burden of the police to investigate. If the transaction is genuine and not under duress, we will let it proceed, but if it turns out to be a digital arrest, it is very hard to recover the money once it is gone. Ultimately, in such cases, prevention is the best cure.”
ACP Makadia added that the onus was not just on bank personnel to be alert but also those in the vicinity of vulnerable people. Giving an example, he said, “In one case, a diligent worker began remaining absent from work. The owner of the company grew suspicious and when asked, the employee said he was involved in a CBI inquiry. The owner informed the 1930 Cyber helpline, who then informed us. And the employee was rescued from digital arrest.”
Older, affluent, lonely people key targets
On December 15, 2025, a septuagenarian couple living alone in a bungalow in the posh area of Ghatlodia in Ahmedabad called their financial consultant around 10 pm and told him to liquidate Rs 93 lakh worth mutual funds. Aware of their financial plans and that their son was well settled in Australia and daughter in the US, their consultant Palak Doshi got alerted.
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On December 16, instead of transferring the funds, Doshi had gone to his client’s residence on the pretext of making him sign some forms. He had strictly been asked to go there only between 12 and 12:30 pm. His client immediately asked for the forms and asked him to leave, instead of sitting him down and discussing financial matters, which Doshi found unusual. His wife stood nervously in a corner, he observed.
Finding his phone on the sofa, he opened WhatsApp and saw a contact labelled ‘Sirji’ which had an ‘Enforcement Directorate summons,’ which Doshi forwarded to himself. He then took their Australia-based son’s consent and contacted the police.
Police Sub-Inspector (PSI) Parth Hirapara was on duty at the Cybercrime Branch in Shahibaug when Doshi came to inform him that his client had been conned. The couple was in danger of not only losing their Rs 93 lakh in mutual funds but also Rs50 lakh in fixed deposits if they did not act fast.
After catching up with the couple at the bank where they had gone to withdraw their FD, but were stopped in time, PSI Hirapara and Doshi went to the bungalow with them.
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At his bungalow, the elderly man would keep going upstairs which the police and the consultant would later learn was to turn on the video call and get arrested “digitally”. The callers who kept him engaged on his wife’s phone, had warned him against involving any other officials or face arrest for money laundering through a “fake bank account created in his name in Canara Bank which was related to Jet Airways founder Naresh Goyal”, said Hirpara.
Scared of the consequences, the victim drove the police out. The fraud callers impersonating Andheri police station presented him on a makeshift court before a person playing judge. They also told the victim that the RBI would reimburse the capital gains tax that he would have to pay when he withdrew his mutual funds to send the money to them. It took the police nearly 12 hours to convince the victim couple that they were there to help. They cried and told the police how they had been harassed for more than a week, how they had been given strict timelines for the maid, their bathroom breaks and even had to eat food in front of the video call under threat of “actual” arrest.
They profusely apologised and thanked Doshi for saving their money. The cyber crime branch now has a dedicated rescue squad of uniformed officials, ready to help as soon as a call arrives.
Assistant Commissioner of Police M M Rajput of the Vadodara Cyber Crime unit cites another case of a woman in her sixties who had retired from a private firm and lost Rs 1.8 crore to criminals who held her up on a video call. When she went to the bank to transfer another Rs 1.4 crore via mutual funds, the bank informed the police.
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“She had been made to believe that her relatives in the US had been kidnapped by the caller. It was only when some relatives got the US family on video to prove they were safe that she believed us and filed the complaint. Investigation in this case remains underway,” said Rajput.
In most cases of digital arrest, the victims are affluent elderly citizens who are unaware of cyber frauds and living alone with nobody else to rely on. The scamsters dressed in police uniforms, as lawyers and even judges, with elaborate background sets of police stations, and even courtrooms, put the fear of the law into their victims to such an extent that they are not only willing to part with all their belongings, including properties and money, but also become extremely hostile to their well wishers, including close family members and friends.
Ex-bankers among victims
Two sisters, aged 74 years and 67 years from Surat, who had retired from two different nationalised banks, also fell prey to cyber fraudsters, but were saved by alert relatives.
“My sisters were hypnotised. They had put such a fear of the law into them that even though both of them are retired bank employees, they were convinced that they had inadvertently been involved in money laundering and would be arrested and taken to Delhi if they did not comply with every order of those who had placed them under ‘digital arrest’…” claimed Dhimant Gangdev, a retired executive engineer whose two sisters had retired as bankers.
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“After giving them the spiel about how they could be incriminated, the scamster ‘police officer in uniform’ put Suhana in touch with a ‘lawyer’ who appeared to be sympathetic to their cause of being falsely implicated in the case. This ‘lawyer’ promised to help her sort it all out. But the caveat was that she had to constantly remain on video call and listen to instructions from the police impersonator. She agreed to it,” said his wife Sheela. And this is how one of the sisters got ‘digitally arrested’.
“When anyone called her, she would have to report it to them and was ordered not to speak to anyone for more than 5 minutes. We spoke once during this ordeal but we didn’t suspect anything. In retrospect, perhaps we should have become alert but that didn’t happen at that time. We thought she must be busy.”
On the second day of the ordeal, the sisters were presented in a virtual ‘courtroom’. They were asked to declare all their investments and informed that it would have to be deposited with the ‘court’.
Gangdev said, “My younger sister wanted to call me at this point but the elder would not let her do so, as she was so convinced that the criminals had them under surveillance and would actually place them under arrest and investigate me as well if they tried to contact me – that was the level of control.”
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On day three, the older sister was “allowed” half an hour to go out to buy groceries. She went to Gangdev’s nephew’s office and told him about their plight but refused to have the matter reported to the police. The nephew however went to their place, took the engaged phone and started shouting on the video call, leading the scamsters to cut the line. The family then approached the Surat City Cybercrime Police.
What banks can do
Superintendent of Police Sanjay Keshwala of the CCoE said, “Many bankers have done good work, contacted police and rescued victims. It all depends on how alert the banking officials are at the branch level. Cashiers have good relations with customers and the elderly go to the bank for everything and mostly don’t use digital banking.
If they can read the behaviour, they can save the vulnerable targets from becoming victims.”
A bank official in South Gujarat told The Indian Express, “In cases of digital arrests, when a customer, especially a senior citizen, comes to break their FD or withdraw large amounts of money, ask them why. Or take up with higher officials. If there’s a small chance of saving the money, we should take it. Who knows, the customer may feel that the bank cares about their safety.”
Notably, there are 50 banks in Gujarat including public sector banks, private sector banks, Gujarat Gramin Bank, cooperative banks, payment banks, and small finance banks, which have approximately 11,000 branches across 34 districts.
Responding to The Indian Express, the State Level Bankers’ Committee (SLBC) Gujarat Convenor Raveesh Kumar said, “Whenever there is a suspicion, employees have been asked to speak to the customer and call the police authority from the nearest Cybercrime Cell if necessary for support and reporting. We have regular training programmes as well.”
On the SLBC and cooperation with the state government and law enforcement, Kumar said, “We have had cooperation with police on cybercrimes for several years now, but the cybercrimes were not so aggressive back then, as they are today. The numbers of frauds have increased with the rise in online banking and transaction methods.”
On the role of the SLBC, he said, “Cybercrime cases are monitored and handled by field branches and respective banking authorities whenever such cases come to their notice. The RBI has directives and we have a Committee on digital payments and prevention of cyber fraud. We conduct a meeting every quarter. While the original purpose was to expand digital payments systems across regions, the RBI subsequently added prevention of digital fraud to the mandate. Cybercrime Police authorities are also invited to these meetings where banks have an open platform to discuss any problems or challenges they face in dealing with these issues.”
(Names of cybercrime victims and relatives have been changed.)
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