Thane: The Naupada police on Tuesday detained an IIT Kanpur student Shubransh Nayak and his five associates in connection with an alleged cryptocurrency fraud.
“The initial complaint is of ₹2.5 lakh, but the scam could burgeon to several crores since we are expecting more complainants to approach us," said a police officer.
A resident of Naupada, Sushil Kangya, had sent a written a complaint to senior inspector Sanjay Dhumal about being defrauded by people associated with multi-level marketing (MLM) companies Dronx.Biz and BNB Pool. He claimed that scam could be to the tune of ₹300 crore. He also sought the police's help in recovering the lost money of ₹2.5 lakhs which he had invested in cryptocurrency.
Invest in the scheme and increase the network
Kangya mentioned in his letter that last year he was approached by two people named Shubhransh Nayak and Pankaj Pandhi who asked him and his sister to invest in a cryptocurrency scheme and get a regular interest of 8 per cent. They also promised that the returns can be even more if they got more people to invest in the scheme and increase the network of people.
“Initially, we invested ₹ 2.5 lakhs and also got returns for a few months. Later the returns stopped. When we asked Shubhransh and Pankaj about non-payment of the returns they showed us a few videos of the prime minister allegedly promoting the organisations and that the companies were genuine," Kangya said.
Fake promotion
The claim about the PM promoting the companies appears to be fake.
“When we realised that it was a scam, we asked for the refund of our money, but we were threatened with dire consequences," Kangya added.
Sanjay Dhumal, senior police inspector, at Naupada police station, said, "We received the letter from complainant Sushil Kangya against two companies named DRONX BIZ and DRONX BNB Pool which are into MLM and involved in a cryptocurrency scam. The names of people running it are Rajesh Bapodra a diamond merchant who lives in Kandivali, Krish Reddy alias Phanni Beejam from Hyderabad, Shubhransh Nayak, Dr Peter Dhanraj, Avinash Upadhyay and Pankaj Pandhi. Based on the complaint lodged by Kangya we have detained them for the investigation. As of now no FIR has been registered against them."
