Illegal call centre busted for selling dead and old smartphones to customers

Based on the tip-off, Gavas along with his team raided the place and arrested Ranka. During the raid, police found that the accused had rented two shops on the first and fourth floor of the same building

Mumbai: The Mumbai crime branch on Wednesday night busted a call centre in Malad West by arresting two persons who allegedly sold old and broken mobile phones pursuant to online orders obtained by promising branded phones at highly discounted rates.

Police officials said a 25-year-old is the mastermind of the racket and is suspected to have duped over a thousand people each of ₹4,200 in the last two to three years. (HT)

Police officials said a 25-year-old is the mastermind of the racket and is suspected to have duped over a thousand people each of ₹4,200 in the last two to three years.

The officials added that around 20 people were working in the call centre and used to make calls to prospective customers. They said the gang mostly targeted people from other states, to avoid registration of cases against them in Mumbai or other parts of the state and attracted customers also through advertisements on social media, offering branded mobile handsets at dirt cheap rates.

The arrested accused were identified as Rahil Jayantilal Ranka, 25, a resident of Malad West and Siddhesh Santosh Tushar, 24, a resident of Hanuman Nagar area in Goregaon (West). Ranka is a graduate in commerce and is suspected to be a main accused in the case.

Police inspector Sachin Gavas of the unit 11 of the crime branch had received information that a person was running an illegal call centre, “Rahil Impex” on the second floor of Neo Complex Plaza in Kanch Pada area in Malad West.

Based on the tip-off, Gavas along with his team raided the place and arrested Ranka. During the raid, police found that the accused had rented two shops on the first and fourth floor of the same building.

Police said the accused was using one shop as his main office and another as a warehouse, where they used to do packaging of old and broken mobile handsets. The fourth floor shop was converted into a call centre, where around 12 to 15 employees used to make calls to find customers, to communicate with people responding to their advertisements on social media, to get their addresses to deliver the phones, said deputy commissioner of police Sangramsingh Nishandar of the crime branch.

The accused circulated advertisements on social media, giving lucrative offers like “bumper offers selling smartphones at ₹4,200 and ₹3,999 with free accessories worth ₹1,700.” The mobile numbers of the people who clicked the link associated with their advertisements used to be shared with the people manning the call centre.

The call centre employees would then immediately call the person concerned and lure him or her in buying the mobile handsets by making online payments. They promised the mobile phone will be delivered at the customer’s residence within a week, Nishandar added.

The accused used to buy from mobile repairing shops dead or old phones for less than Rs. 500 a piece. Ranka had hired a few people who used to clean the phones and pack them in new boxes and later be delivered at customer’s home, added Nishandar.

During the raid the police seized a total 3,199 such old phones and a list of 300 people whose addresses and contact numbers were mentioned. Most of the people were from south India, Delhi, Surat, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. As of now no FIR has been filed against the accused in Mumbai, he added. The accused were arrested on Thursday morning and produced before a court that remanded them to police custody till Saturday.