Three alleged online fraudsters were arrested by the sleuths from Cyber Economics and Narcotics (CEN) police station of Mysuru district for allegedly duping a job aspirant of more than ₹48 lakh by promising him employment. A resident of Sathgalli on the outskirts of Mysuru, who had lost his job during COVID-19 pandemic, was searching jobs online when he landed on a website in November 2020 that promised him a job. After he entered his particulars and other details on the website and registered himself as a job aspirant, he received a phone call from the company running the website. The caller asked him to transfer money to begin processing his application for the job.
The complainant transferred the amount sought by the caller, hoping to get the job. But, he kept receiving calls from the allegedly fraudulent company for transferring more money under the pretext of making an agreement and other reasons.
“Between November 2020 and April 2022, the complainant had been made to transfer ₹ 48,80,500 from his bank account to the bank account of the accused”, Superintendent of Mysuru district police R Chetan told reporters in Mysuru on Friday. But, whenever the complainant called the accused and asked for the progress made on his job application, he was either receiving lame excuses or requests for transferring more money. Finally, the complainant was fed up and sought a refund of the money he had already paid them.
When the accused failed to return the money he had transferred, the complainant realised that he had been cheated and lodged a complaint with Mysuru district CEN police station on June 29, 2022. Immediately, a team of officials from the CEN police station took up the investigation and swiftly zeroed down on the accused. While three accused persons had been arrested, the mobile phones, laptops and SIM cards used to commit the crime had been seized apart from recovering ₹ 24 lakh in cash out of the money that had been fraudulently transferred from the job seeker. Mr. Chetan suspects that there are more victims who had fallen prey to the online fraudsters, who were promising jobs. “This is the amount of money involved in the cheating of one complainant. Investigations so far have revealed that there are several others, who have been cheated in a similiar manner by the accused. Also, there are a few more accused involved in the scam, who are yet to be arrrested”, he said. In coming days, the CEN police sleuths will not only identify the victims, but also the accused, Mr Chetan added.
