Delhi: 31-year-old arrested for duping hundreds of people of ₹1.4 crore

Police said that more than 85 cyber complaints from 21 states have been registered against the accused

A 31-year-old man was arrested from Sirsa, Haryana for allegedly duping hundreds of people through fake investment schemes and fake jobs to promote YouTube channels, the Delhi Police said on Saturday. Police added that more than 85 cyber complaints from 21 states have been registered against the accused.

Police said that after the victims paid hefty sums to the accused, the latter deleted all groups and ended all contact with them. (Representational image)

The accused, Raja Kumar, who was an electrician before he joined a cyber-criminal gang, has stolen at least ₹1.4 crore in the last four months from his victims, police said. Police said that they got on the case after a businessman approached the cyber police station in Dwarka, south-west Delhi last December saying that he was cheated of ₹3.3 lakh.

“The victim told us that someone not known to him added him to a Telegram group where the members discussed schemes such as promoting YouTube channels in return for a lot of money. After gaining the trust of some of the group members, the accused asked some of them to invest in packages linked to promoting channels and assured them that they would get high returns. The victim was also asked to like and share thousands of videos on YouTube and subscribe to multiple channels for the job,” said a police officer.

Police said that after the victims paid hefty sums to the accused, the latter deleted all groups and ended all contact with them.

“The investigating team found that the accused worked for a gang. We tried looking for phone numbers and call detail records. The team mounted surveillance on many suspects. Finally, we found that one of the accused was in Haryana,” said deputy commissioner of police (Dwarka) Ankit Singh.

However, by the time the police arrived at his house in Sirsa, the accused had discovered that the police were hunting him, and he had fled, said officers.

“Based on technical surveillance for days, Kumar was nabbed after an 80km chase. He was arrested on Wednesday. During the investigation, we found he opened a bank account to receive the money from the victims. He was caught with two active SIM cards,” said the DCP.

Kumar is a member of a larger syndicate based in Haryana and overseas which has been duping hundreds of victims for months, police said. Police said they “blocked” transactions worth ₹1.4 crore in his account which are all “suspicious”. Interrogation is being done to identify the other accused, said police.