A 52-year-old man from Pune fell victim to scammers who promised high returns on investments in gold mining and forex trading, defrauding him of Rs77.74 lakh.
On August 20 last year, he received a call from an unknown woman who introduced him to the scheme, stating that he could start with a minimum investment of Rs50,000. A few days later, the scammer shared a web link, asking him to register with his name, WhatsApp number, email ID, and bank account details. After completing the registration, he saw that an investment account had been created on a trading portal.
On August 28, he invested Rs50,000 and noticed that his funds were converted into dollars, which he could track on the platform. Believing the platform to be genuine, he continued investing. Over four months, he made 51 transactions, transferring Rs77.74 lakh into various bank accounts under the scammers’ instructions.
When he checked his trading account, he saw that his investments had grown to Rs2.57 crore in INR. Initially, he was able to withdraw Rs25,200. However, from December 21, his withdrawal requests were denied. When he asked the scammers, they demanded Rs26 lakh as a ‘risk security deposit’ to secure the funds from money laundering and illegal activities.
Realising that he was duped, the man approached the cyber crime police Pune and a case was filed last week under sections 318 (cheating), 319 (cheating by personation) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and section 66D (cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act.
