With nude pics, loan app, gang dupes Chandigarh woman of 43 lakh

As per the police, the accused have been identified as Adesh Kumar, Tanveer Khan and Wazid, all three residents of Ghaziabad, and Mahfooz Alam, a resident of East Delhi. The accused would target innocent people, blackmail them by sending morphed nude pictures of victim to their WhatsApp contacts, which is operated from Dubai.

The police said that a case was registered on the complaint of a woman from Chandigarh, in which she alleged that in March 2023, she received a notification on her mobile from, Real Money application. As she clicked on the notification, the application got installed in her mobile. After that, the application sought her bank account details, which she filled, and then she received Rs 1,800 in her account. She tried to refund the said loan amount but it was not accepted by the application.

After a few days, she received a message on her WhatsApp that she has not paid her loan amount and then she was sent different loan applications — “See Money, Hello Cash, One Cash, S Cash, Sea Money, D Money, Okay Lends, T Loan, Swift Loan, U Cash, Fast Cash etc.”

She also received threatening calls on her WhatsApp through different numbers, following which she transferred the amount through UPI to many bank accounts which were provided to her. The accused then blackmailed her by using different mobile/WhatsApp numbers, as they had access to her contacts and images of her mobile phone. They also sent her morphed nude photograph to her contacts through WhatsApp. The woman transferred approximately Rs 43,81,920 in the accused UPI ID’s/ bank accounts, said the police.

During the course of investigation, records from alleged banks were obtained and scrutinised. Upon secret information and on the basis of technical surveillance, a raid was conducted in Rajender Nagar, Ghaziabad area, on March 1, 2024, and the accused were arrested. The accused were produced before a court, where five-day police remand of all accused was obtained. The accused were sent to judicial custody on Wednesday.

On the gang’s modus operandi, the police said that Wazid is the mastermind of managing the bank accounts for cheating purpose. He opened many shell trading firms in different names by using documents of arrested persons Adesh Kumar and Tanveer Khan and also open current bank accounts in different banks in the names of these firms by using their documents. He also obtained SIM cards in their names to register the same in current bank accounts which were also opened in the names of Adesh Kumar and Tanveer Khan. After that, he sent details of these accounts and SIM cards to Mafooj Alam for cheating.

The police said that Mafooj Alam was in contact with other persons through Telegram application. He provided the bank account details, SIM card details through Telegram to fraudsters. Alam would get 1 per cent or 1.5 per cent on every transaction of Rs 1 crore and he gave a share to Wazid who provided him accounts.

During the course of investigation, the police learnt that accounts of different banks from various states — MP, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Mumbai — are involved in cheating and transactions in crores of amount have been done in these accounts. Investigation in this connection is going on, said a police official.