Fintech firm staff, five others held for cyber fraud

The fraud was reported in January 2025, in which the victim lost ₹2,80,432 in an online investment fraud

The Pimpri-Chinchwad police cyber cell has arrested an employee of a fintech company and five others for using the firm’s account to receive cyber fraud money, said police on Tuesday.

According to the police, the accused used platforms such as Airpay, Instant Pay, Pay World, and Spice Money to create accounts to deposit money obtained through fraudulent means into these wallet accounts instead of direct bank transfers. (REPRESENTATIVE PIC)

The fraud was reported in January 2025, in which the victim lost ₹2,80,432 in an online investment fraud.

The accused have been identified as Naresh Sujaram Chaudhari, who runs a photocopy shop at Ghatkopar East; Jilani Jani Sheikh associated with fabrication business from Ghatkopar West; Online money traders Amit Batulal Shahu from Uran and Irfan Khalil Sheikh from Panvel; cloth merchant Kiran Vasudev Jethnani from Panvel and Makrand Sanjiv Vilegaonkar who is area sales manager at Airpay from Panvel East. The accused were arrested last week.

According to the police, the accused used platforms such as Airpay, Instant Pay, Pay World, and Spice Money to create accounts to deposit money obtained through fraudulent means into these wallet accounts instead of direct bank transfers. The funds accumulated were withdrawn under the name of CMS Collection companies instead of being directly transferred to their bank accounts. Upon detecting these transactions, the CMS Collection companies withheld the deposited funds. After realising this, the accused attempted to withdraw the remaining amount in cash, but the police intercepted the transactions in time.

Pravin Swami, assistant police inspector, said, “The accused used fintech account to receive cyber fraud money and later on the basis of commission they handed over cash to the respective person in the chain by doing money laundering.”