Delhi: 6 held for SIM card racket

The six were traced after police launched a campaign against people using phone connections with illegal identity papers, as part of their security drill ahead of the Independence Day.

Six men, who bought SIM cards using fake documents and sold them to frauds involved in cybercrime, have been arrested, police said on Saturday. Police said they have recovered over 1,500 SIM cards that were procured using fake identity papers from outside Delhi. Police said the men operated the racket in Delhi, Haryana, and Odisha.

The first arrest came on July 30, when police received a tip-off about two men, involved in the racket, who were coming to north Delhi’s Haiderpur to deliver the cards to their contacts. (Getty images. Representative image)

The six were traced after police launched a campaign against people using phone connections with illegal identity papers, as part of their security drill ahead of the Independence Day.

The first arrest came on July 30, when police received a tip-off about two men, involved in the racket, who were coming to north Delhi’s Haiderpur to deliver the cards to their contacts.

Usha Rangnani, deputy commissioner of police(north west) said the two men purchased the sim cards from other states and used it to create email addresses on the phone and make accounts on e-shopping sites. The two men told the police about their contacts and their employers, following which four people were arrested from Haryana and Odisha.

“Till now total 6 accused persons have been arrested and total of 1,549 SIM cards have been recovered. They disclosed that they obtained these SIM cards using forged documents and used these to create IDs on various shopping portals to purchase mobile phones. They used to sell these mobile phones to cyber criminals who cheated people online,” DCP Rangnani said, adding that the police are on the lookout for two other persons involved in the racket.

Police are also probing the nature of the cyber crimes that these men were involved in after getting the phones activated using fake documents.

Investigation so far has revealed that the two men, currently absconding, sold the SIM cars to people who run fake call centres. Of the six men arrested three are from Delhi, two from Odisha and one from Haryana.

In another similar racket busted in south Delhi, four men were arrested for misusing identity paper of genuine customers and using it to get SIM cards. The four, police said, sold SIM card to those who run fake call centres. Police seized at least 261 SIM cards issued by one of the men, who is a SIM card seller in South Delhi’s Tughlakabad Extension.