Chandigarh: 5 held for duping retired Air Marshal of ₹3.36 lakh

They were arrested in connection to a case registered on September 7 based on the complaint of Ravinder Kumar Dhir, a retired Air Marshal and former adviser to the Gujarat government

Chandigarh Police have arrested five men for duping a former Air Marshal of ₹3.36 lakh by posing as Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) officials.

Police said the victim was looking to register an electricity meter for his flat in Mohali and the accused duped him by posing as PSPCL officials. (iStock)

The accused have been identified as Danna Khan, 55, of Bareilly; and Sonu Kumar Pandey, 29, Anuj Kumar, 26, Govinda Kumar, 21, and Anoop Kumar Tiwari, 32, all from of Bihar. While Danna, Anuj and Sonu were sent to judicial custody, police have got five-day remand of Govinda and Anoop.

Police have recovered a debit card, two credit cards and seven mobile phones from the accused.

Danna had studied till Class 4 and was working as property dealer; Sonu studied till Class 12 and was running a mobile shop. Anuj Kumar, a matriculate, was also running a mobile Shop; Govinda Kumar, a matriculate, allegedly sold illicit liquor and Tiwari studied till Class 12 and worked as an accountant at jewellery shop.

Modus operandi

They were arrested in connection to a case registered on September 7 based on the complaint of Ravinder Kumar Dhir, a retired Air Marshal and former adviser to the Gujarat government .

At the time that the complaint was lodged, he was putting up at the officers’ mess of 12 Wing Air Force Station, Chandigarh. In his complaint, Dhir said he had purchased a flat in Sector 66-A, Mohali, and wanted to register a PSPCL electricity meter for it.

He called on the helpline number on PSPCL’s site. A person who introduced himself as Amit Kumar took the call and asked Dhir to transfer ₹25 to a bank account. He also asked the complainant to link his google pay UPI to his SBI and HDFC Account. After this, ₹3.26 lakh was debited in multiple transaction from his account.

When he realised he had been duped, he filed a complaint and a cheating case was registered at cyber crime police station.

Money trail led to arrest of accused

During investigation, police found that ₹1.11 lakh stolen from Dhir’s account was transferred to the account of DK Enterprises, which was owned by Danna. Based on this information, Danna was arrested from Bareilly on November 23.

It was also found that amount ₹1.20 lakh was transferred through Razor Pay to Anuj and Sonu. On their arrest from Bihar, police found that the amount was transferred on the instance of Govinda Kumar and Anoop Kumar Tiwari, who were arrested from Champaran in Bihar on December 7.

Govinda and Anoop had met in jail. While Govinda was arrested for smuggling illicit liquor, Anoop was accused of embezzling ₹1.5 crore from his employer.