The Delhi Police on Tuesday said they had busted a fake call centre in Uttar Pradesh’s Agra involved in pan-India matrimonial cyber fraud after arresting a 29-year-old lawyer and eight women from Agra.
The arrested people duped men seeking potential matches by allegedly using fake profiles, staging conversations with women impersonating prospective brides, and tricking them into paying money on one pretext or the other, the police said, adding the gang operated the racket under the garb of a website registered as a matchmaking service provider.
“Further probe revealed that the racket was being run through a call centre in Agra. It was done to discourage complainants from lodging complaints for the small cheated amount. Their interrogation led to the arrest of the lawyer,” added DCP Singh.
The arrested people were identified as Amit Kumar, a 29-year-old practicing lawyer from Agra and owner of the fake call centre, Jaya Shakya, 44-year-old on-board operation manager of the call centre, and seven tele-callers from Agra Jyoti Kumari, 27, Karishma Sharma, 24, Rashmi, 24, Anshu Kumari, 32, Meghna Parashar, 23, Padma, 26, and Aashika, 21. They allegedly impersonated prospective brides apart from contacting clients and luring them into paying money for finding their suitable matches. , “The fraudsters’ core strategy was ‘cheat small, cheat many’, as they deliberately capped the fraud amount at R15,000 per victim. The call centre was raided on September 4 and eight women were arrested.
The firm that Kumar operated was also registered under the ministry of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) and the Uttar Pradesh labour department, while banking channels and SIM cards were procured in its name,” said deputy commissioner of police (central) Rohit Rajbir Singh.
Police said the arrests were made following investigation into a case registered last year on the complaint of a man who was allegedly lured through a website and cheated of ₹ 15,000 on the pretext of registration, profile access, activation and contact unlocking charges. Investigators found that a current account in which the cheated money had been transferred was registered in the name of a matching making service providing firm.
Analysis of the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCRP) database showed that the account was linked to six complaints from different parts of the country involving a similar modus operandi, the police said.
