Special Task Force (STF) of Uttarakhand police on Sunday evening arrested a 41-year-old man for digitally arresting a retired vice-chancellor of a university in Nainital and duping her of ₹1.47 crore in August last year.
The accused, identified as Bhupinder Singh, is a resident of Ambala in Haryana. The victim, Dr Beena Shah, 72, former vice-chancellor of Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohilkhand University, resides in Mallital, Nainital.
“The accused had kept the victim under digital arrest through WhatsApp calls for 12 days and induced her to transfer a total of ₹1.47 crore to multiple bank accounts,” senior superintendent of police (STF) Ajai Singh said.
A first information report (FIR) was registered at the cyber police station in Rudrapur under sections 3(5), 61(2) and 318(4) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and Section 66D of the Information Technology (IT) Act.
On August 14, 2025, she received a phone call from a man claiming to be a senior official of the Reserve Bank of India, who alleged that ₹7-8 crore obtained through hawala transactions had been illegally credited to her account.
Soon afterwards, she received a video call from another person posing as an officer of the Maharashtra police. The caller threatened her with arrest and other legal action and directed her to transfer money to designated bank accounts, assuring her that the amount would be refunded once the purported investigation was completed.
{{/usCountry}}Soon afterwards, she received a video call from another person posing as an officer of the Maharashtra police. The caller threatened her with arrest and other legal action and directed her to transfer money to designated bank accounts, assuring her that the amount would be refunded once the purported investigation was completed.
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Fearing arrest, Shah transferred funds from three of her bank accounts to five accounts allegedly controlled by the fraudsters. When bank officials questioned the unusually large transactions, she told them that the money was meant for the purchase of a new house. By the time bank employees alerted her relatives and the police, ₹1.47 crore had already been siphoned off.
“Our investigators traced the ₹50 lakh of the defrauded amount to the account of the arrested accused. We then arrested him following technical analysis, examination of digital evidence and sustained surveillance,” Singh said.
“Our further investigation into the matter is underway,” he added.