Mumbai: The Thane Police Crime Branch have busted a racket based in Ambernath in which Indian nationals were allegedly cheating U.S. citizens by posing as bankers and asking them to pay “processing fees” for loans. The scam is similar to a telecalling racket busted by the Thane Crime Branch last year, in which the accused were posing as officials of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service.
According to the police, the lid was blown off the racket when the Crime Branch received a tip-off about a scam being operated from a building in Ambernath. Multiple teams conducted a raid on the premises of the Mount Logic Solutions in the Ramesh Enterprises building early on Friday.
“The accused were calling up U.S. nationals and claiming to be representatives of the Columbus Bank. They would tell the victims that the bank had approved a personal loan up to $6,000 for them, and proceed to ask questions about their jobs, income and other aspects before telling them that they would have to pay ‘processing fees’. This amount would be anywhere between $100 and $500,” said Madhukar Pandey, Joint Commissioner of Police, Thane Police.
Unique payment mode
Mr. Pandey added that the payment would be exacted through iTunes cards, which would then be converted to cash.
“The accused would use Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) facility to call the victims, and preliminary investigations indicate that they had a monthly turnover of ₹8 lakh to ₹9 lakh, although this figure is still being verified. The racket has been operations since at least 2015, according to our inquiries so far,” said a Crime Branch officer.
The police have arrested eight accused who were in charge of the entire operation, while 18 others, who were employed by these eight people and were present in the office at the time of the raids, are still being questioned.
Fake names, accents
“The employees were all between 20 to 25 years of age and were trained to speak in American accents before being put to work. They would call up the victims using false Western names. We are still working on unearthing the finer aspects of the racket,” the officer added.
The accused have been charged with cheating under the Indian Penal Code along with sections of the Information Technology Act, said officers.
In June last year, the Thane Crime Branch had arrested 70 people for allegedly extorting money from American tax-payers.
The racket involved trained telecallers, who would call up U.S. citizens claiming to be nternal Revenue Service officials and tell them that there were irregularities in their taxes and that action was imminent. The accused would then extract money from the victims to “settle” the matter, and were allegedly making crores of rupees every month.
