Kanpur resident arrested for duping Merchant Navy job aspirants

Mumbai A 26-year-old man from Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, has been arrested for allegedly cheating several people across the country on the pretext of giving them jobs in Merchant Navy, through a fake account on Facebook, and charging them money

Mumbai A 26-year-old man from Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, has been arrested for allegedly cheating several people across the country on the pretext of giving them jobs in Merchant Navy, through a fake account on Facebook, and charging them money. Shubham Gupta was arrested from his residence on Monday and brought to the city.

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According to Bandopant Bansode, senior police inspector of Amboli police station, Gupta had made a fake account on Facebook using the name of “VR Marine” company and posted an advertisement about vacancies in Merchant Navy. When applicants began calling the VR Marine company to enquire about the placements, the company officials discovered the fraud.

A few weeks ago, the VR Marine company officials approached Amboli police and a cheating case was registered against an unidentified man. “After we received the complaint, we began tracking the Internet Protocol address of the computer through which the fake account on Facebook was set up,” said an officer from the Amboli police station. On Monday, the police tracked the address of the accused to Kanpur.

“We took help of the local police and arrested Gupta from his house and also seized his computer,” said Bansode.

On investigation, the police found out that more than 60 people had been victims of Gupta’s fraud. “We are yet to contact the victims and understand how they were lured by his promise of getting them jobs in Merchant Navy and how much did Gupta charge each of them for the ‘placement service’,” said Bansode.

“We have arrested Gupta and produced him before the court in Mumbai,” added Bansode.