Mumbai: An 87-year-old retired BMC doctor recently lost Rs 16.14 lakh to online fraudsters.
About The Case
According to the FIR, Dr S Bhutani, a resident of Khar West, googled ‘BMC H-West Ward (Khar)’ on December 20, 2024, while trying to arrange pest control for her housing society. A woman answered her call and told the doctor that she had to pay a Rs 50 registration fee to avail pest control services. She then handed the call over to a man when Dr Bhutani informed him that she did not use online banking services.
While the man kept her engaged and obtained her bank details, Dr Bhutani received a notification that Rs 2.86 lakh had been debited from her Kotak Mahindra Bank account. She grew suspicious and confronted the man, but he claimed that the money had been mistakenly credited to the BMC’s account. He assured her that Rs 1 lakh had been refunded, urged her not to disconnect the call, and said he couldn’t transfer more than Rs 1 lakh per day.
He then asked her to call again the next day. Dr Bhutani visited Kotak Mahindra Bank, Axis Bank, and Saraswat Bank, where she held accounts, the next day and asked them to stop all online transactions. However, she forgot to visit Punjab National Bank (PNB). On February 1, during a visit to PNB to update her passbook, she discovered that Rs 13.35 lakh had been withdrawn from her account. She then inquired at her other banks and learned that small amounts had been debited from each of her accounts in January.
In total, she lost more than Rs16 lakh. The West Cyber Region registered a case on April 3.
