Delhi Police arrests four men in an investment scam bust

Police said one of the complainant was convinced to invest close to ₹6 crore in a high-return trading account on social media. After initially showing fabricated profits, the syndicate blocked access to withdrawals and stopped responding. Other National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) complaints revealed more than ₹1.1 crore has been cheated.

With the arrest of four people, Delhi Police’s crime branch has claimed to bust a ₹7 crore investment fraud nexus which was operational across the country. The accused, police said, were operating a multi-layered money-routing system with the help of Dubai-based handlers and fake stock trading platforms.

The gang has been active for around eight months (Representative photo)

While the gang has been active for around eight months, complaints about a London-based financial services firm started coming in April, claiming that representatives of the firm had cheated some people.

Police said one of the complainant was convinced to invest close to ₹6 crore in a high-return trading account on social media. After initially showing fabricated profits, the syndicate blocked access to withdrawals and stopped responding. Other National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) complaints revealed more than ₹1.1 crore has been cheated.

Aditya Gautam, deputy commissioner of police (DCP) crime, said, “During investigation, police found that the cheated amount was diverted into 33 bank accounts to obscure the trail. Multiple layers of shell companies and rapid withdrawals were used to break traceability.”

He said the team traced the source of few of the accounts and raids were conducted in Uttarakhand’s Haldwani, from where the four arrests have been made.

The accused, Anas Ansari, 22; Mohd Kaif, 22; Akib, 40; and Md Danish 22 — were not only working as mule account operators who provided bank accounts, ATM cards, OTP access and withdrew cash on commission for syndicate handlers, but also worked with a Dubai-based handler.

“They opened shell companies with Mumbai addresses and were involved in diverting funds through layers to evade police,” said an in investigator.

In a separate operation, the cyber cell also arrested two people who allegedly facilitated another scam involving an investment platform, wherein a complainant lost ₹2.3 crore. The accused, Sajjad Ahmad, 35; and Uttam Mandal, 40 allegedly provided accounts. Police said the gang shared profits with them in return for handing over complete banking kits of individuals to fraud operators. The men were arrested from Delhi last week.

Police said the cheated money was routed through multiple bank accounts, including a current business account. Police said ₹20 lakh has so far been traced across linked accounts.

“The victims, mostly contacted on Facebook, were added to groups that displayed manipulated dashboards showing fake profits. Withdrawals were then blocked,” said the DCP.