Imposter dupes bank manager, gets ₹16.7 lakh transferred from car showroom owner’s account

The suspect called from a mobile phone number saying his phone number -- meaning the car showroom owner’s phone number -- registered with the bank was not working, police said

The owner of a car showroom was cheated of more than ₹16 lakh by suspects who impersonated him and convinced the manager of a private bank to transfer money from his bank account, police said Wednesday.

The suspect sent a company letterhead with the showroom owner’s forged signature to the Yes Bank manager on WhatsApp as a mandate for the transactions (HT Archive)

According to police, the complainant in this case, Amit Kumar, manager of the Yes Bank branch in Sector 14 in the city, received a call on November 4 from a person who claimed to be the owner of a car showroom in the city.

The suspect called from a mobile phone number saying his phone number -- meaning the car showroom owner’s phone number -- registered with the bank was not working, police said.

He cited urgent business-related financial needs and asked Kumar to transfer ₹7.26 lakh and ₹9.54 lakh from “his account” to two accounts in separate banks at Sector 22 in Dwarka, New Delhi, and Greater Noida.

Police said the bank account in Dwarka was in the name of a certain Amit Mallik while the other was in the name of another Amit Kumar.

“The suspect sent a company letterhead with the showroom owner’s forged signature to the bank manager on WhatsApp as a mandate for the transactions. The signatures matched with those in the bank’s records, according to banking authorities,” a police officer said.

Within minutes of the money being transferred to these two accounts, it was further transacted into three more bank accounts, said a senior police officer.

“These three bank accounts were in Kolkata and the money was withdrawn immediately there. So, there are multiple suspects involved in this case,” the police officer said.

The bank authorities sent their representative to the showroom to meet the owner and complete formalities for the transaction but he was not in office. They called on the mobile phone number of the suspect, who continued to impersonate the owner and said he would send someone to meet the officials at the reception. But no one came and later the phone number was switched off. “At this moment, bank officials realised they had been duped. They sent an email to the two beneficiary banks to freeze the accounts, but it was too late and money had already been transacted to the three other accounts for withdrawal by then,” a senior police officer said.

An FIR was registered against unidentified suspects under sections 419 (cheating by personation) and 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) of the Indian Penal Code at Cyber Crime police station (West) on Tuesday evening, said police.

Kumar, the bank manager, did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Inspector Poonam Kumari, who is investigating the case, said the suspects will be arrested soon.