Insurance agents in Mumbai booked for duping 1,129 policyholders

Mumbai: Tata AIG General Insurance company has filed a police complaint after a group of more than 10 insurance agents duped the company’s 1,129 policyholders, and also cost the company around ₹1

Mumbai: Tata AIG General Insurance company has filed a police complaint after a group of more than 10 insurance agents duped the company’s 1,129 policyholders, and also cost the company around ₹1.53 crore.

The company received less premium against the policies, and thus suffered wrongful loss, the officer added.

The NM Joshi Marg police have booked Amit Kewat, Raju Yadav, Harshad Tiwari and unidentified users of 10 email ids.

According to the FIR filed on the complaint of Padmakar Tripathi, associate vice president at Tata AIG General Insurance, the accused racket members would offer four-wheeler insurance at cheaper rates to the policy buyers and while filing their details online used to fill two-wheelers, instead of four wheelers.

“They would then put their email ids to get the system generated real policy document and would send a forged policy document to the policy buyer. The accused would collect the four-wheeler’s insurance premium (which is lesser than the actual market price) from policy buyers and deposit the two-wheeler’s premium with the insurance company. They would pocket the excess amount,” said a police officer.

The fraud surfaced after the complainant insurance company during an internal audit in July 2021 discovered that the same mobile phone numbers, email IDs and IP (internet protocol) addresses were used to obtain 1,129 third-party vehicle insurance policies via Policybazaar in 2020-21.

“When the company officials further checked the details of the insured vehicles on the government website, they noticed several discrepancies about the type of insured vehicles. Company officials then discovered that a group of insurance policy agents under the pretext of selling vehicle insurance policies at cheaper rates were defrauding policy buyers and the insurance company as well,” a police officer said.

The company received less premium against the policies, and thus suffered wrongful loss, the officer added.

The company had in April this year complained with the police commissioner. The commissioner had then directed officials of Unit-3, the Mumbai crime branch to conduct a preliminary inquiry. The crime branch officials in the inquiry found material indicating the commission of a cognizable offence and therefore on Friday an FIR was registered.

The police are now looking for the wanted accused and also calling victim policy buyers to record their statements, a police source said.