Woman senior manager loses ₹20.81 lakh in customs fraud

According to the police complaint filed on Friday, the 59-year-old senior-level manager working at the Aundh office of an Australia-based firm received a phone call from an unknown number on July 13 claiming to be representative of an international courier company

Pune: The Pune cyber police have booked an unidentified person for allegedly cheating a woman resident of Karvenagar of ₹20.81 lakh on the pretext of her parcel, containing six fake passports, credit cards and drugs, being stuck with the customs department, said officials.

The caller said that her confiscated parcel contains illegal items. She gets next call from another unknown number claiming to be an officer named “Swami” from the Mumbai police cyber crime unit. (REPRESENTATIVE PIC)

According to the police complaint filed on Friday, the 59-year-old senior-level manager working at the Aundh office of an Australia-based firm received a phone call from an unknown number on July 13 claiming to be representative of an international courier company. The caller said that her confiscated parcel contains illegal items. She gets next call from another unknown number claiming to be an officer named “Swami” from the Mumbai police cyber crime unit. The caller also has a video call with the victim telling her that the parcel contained six fake passports, five credit cards and 40 gm MDMA drugs powder. Claiming that suspicious money transactions were detected in her bank account, the caller demanded transfer of money to accused’s account to validate the financial transactions carried out from her account was as per the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) norms.

The officer said that the complainant did not consult her colleagues or alert the police station located a few metres from her office before transferring the money online.

Cyber police station has filed a case under Sections 419, 420, 506 and 34 of the IPC and Sections 66 C and D of the Information Technolgy Act.