Dombivli police arrest three from Delhi in loan sanction fraud

Within 10 days, the team had reached Delhi and Himachal Pradesh with the exact tower locations of all of the three accused. And one-by-one, all three accused were arrested. ATM cards with ₹9.21 lakh in bank accounts and five mobile phones were seized from the accused

Dombivli The Dombivli-Manpada police have arrested three people from Delhi who allegedly cheated a railway gang man for ₹7.34 lakh by promising to get his ₹27 lakh loan application sanctioned from a financial institution.

Kalyan, India - December 22, 2022: Dombivli's Manpada police arrest three accused from Delhi for their alleged involvement in looting people for lakhs of rupees on the pretext to getting their loan amount sanctioned, in Kalyan, India, on Thursday, December 22, 2022. (Photo by Pramod Tambe/HT Photo). (HT PHOTO)

According to the police, complainant Anil Awhad, 43, works as a gang man in a railway department and lives with his family of four in Dombivli. He had already taken a ₹10-lakh loan for some personal work, but was looking for a higher loan amount so that he could build his house in village. Since the interest rate on the previous loan was high, he was searching for an institution which could grant him a loan at lower interest.

Assistant police commissioner, S Kurade said, “Awhad contacted several financial companies and banks to get the loan with lesser interest rate. His number circulated and in the first week of October, he got a call from a person who, pretending to be from the well-known finance company, informed him that his loan had been sanctioned. Awhad was happy and started following up with the caller to get the amount.”

The caller then asked to transfer ₹30,000 to get the loan amount directly in Awhad’s bank account. On a few occasions, the caller asked him to transfer different amounts into different bank accounts. Later he was assured that a loan of ₹20 lakh had been sanctioned, but would need to pay more money to get it. “In a span of two months, Awhad ended up transfering around ₹7 lakh in different bank accounts to get the sanctioned money in his account,” Kurade said.

Till December 2022, Awhad had not received a single rupee of his ‘sanctioned’ loan into his account. Realizing that he had been cheated, he approached the police on December 5 to file a complaint. The investigating team of senior police inspector Shekhar Bagade, API Sunil Tarmale, and API Avinash Vanave formed a team and began their investigations into the transactions between Awhad and the caller.

The team not only got the details of the numbers from where the complainant got the calls, but all numbers linked to it were traced. Within 10 days, the team had reached Delhi and Himachal Pradesh with the exact tower locations of all of the three accused. And one-by-one, all three accused were arrested. ATM cards with ₹9.21 lakh in bank accounts and five mobile phones were seized from the accused.

The accused were identified as Naman Gupta, 22, Akashkumar Chandwani, 28, and Rishi Singh, 28. The accused have been using the modus operandi for the past two to three years to cheat people. While Rishi and Akashkumar were the main characters, Naman had joined them recently. They live with their families in different areas of Delhi. They have cheated several people from Maharashtra, Gujarat, UP, Himachal and further investigations are on, the police said.

Police also circulated a comic book published by the Reserve Bank of India to create awareness about cybercrime frauds. “Raju and the Forty Thieves” is a cartoon book published by Reserve Bank of India, to explain all kinds of online fraud. The book uses a comic book format of caricatures to narrate lucidly how cyber frauds are committed.

In the past year, several complaints alleging loan sanction fraud have been filed with the Dombivli police.