A 40-year-old Kamothe resident lost Rs 5.9 lakhs to fraudsters after he was lured with monetary benefits before maturity of the policy. The complainant had missed to pay the premium during COVID-19 and the fraudsters took benefits to cheat him. Kamothe police registered a case of cheating against five persons.
Mumtaz Isar Ahmed, who has a business of fabrication was having an insurance policy with an insurance company. According to police, he was paying Rs 25,000 very year since 2013. However, he missed to pay the premium during 2020 due to COVID induced lockdown. As per the policy plan, he was supposed to pay 10 years continuously and the policy will mature at the end of 20 years.
In January 2021, he received a call from a person who identified herself as Kirti Chauhan and asked him to talk to his senior if he wanted to get his insurance money before the maturity. She also provided him a four-digit code to share with the senior. When he called to the given number, another person identified as Rahul Sharma informed him that his insurance agent was asking for his commission and they need his permission. He was also asked to pay Rs 61,000 else his insurance policy will be lapsed.
In the same manner, different people from the same group kept calling him for the next one month and in the name of processing charge, stamp duty, GST and to get a bonus amount, they extorted a total of Rs 5,93,000 from Ahmed. “They also promised him that he would get Rs 17 lakh maturity amount including a bonus and kept taking money from him,” said a police official from Kamothe police station.
When Ahmed said that he did not have enough money to give them, the fraudsters told him that they were sending a team for verification at his him and post verification, a total of Rs 17 lakh insurance would be released. However, even after a month, none of them came to his house for verification. When he called to those numbers, all numbers were switched off. After realizing that he was cheated on, he lodged a complaint with Kamothe police. Following his complaint, Kamothe police registered a case of cheating against five persons under section 420 and 34 of IPC and started the investigation.
