A retired Indian Forest Service officer was duped of his post-retirement savings of Rs 11.70 lakh by a man posing as a treasury officer of the Gwalior pension department, the Delhi Police said, adding that the accused then bought jewellery from the money.
According to the police, on October 24, a 61-year-old resident of Vasant Enclave lodged a complaint saying that he had been duped. The man said that he had retired recently and his pension disbursing agency was based in Gwalior. He told the police that he got a call from a man claiming to be a treasury officer of the pension department in Gwalior.
“The alleged caller claimed that to incur the benefits of his pension account, the complainant needed to complete some important documentation. The caller then shared a link and asked the complainant to fill in the details,” Surender Chaudhary, Deputy Commissioner of Police (South West), said.
The former officer submitted the form, and immediately, a slew of transactions was carried out from his account, the police said. “The money trail revealed that Rs 5 lakh was transferred into an account belonging to Lochan Prasad from Kotmi area of Chhattisgarh. The money was then subsequently transferred to HDFC and DCBL accounts based in Champa district. The money was then withdrawn in Asansol, West Bengal,” DCP Chaudhary said.
On October 28, a team led by Station House Officer Vikas Kumar Buldak of the cyber police station in the South West district reached Asansol. The money trail revealed that one of the accounts was used to pay at a jewellery shop using a point of sale (POS) terminal, the police said. The CCTV footage revealed that the man who withdrew the money from the accounts was the same person who bought the jewellery.
“On November 9, Lochan Prasad was arrested from Champa. He revealed that he was asked to open a Union Bank account by one Vikas Kumar for a commission of Rs 5,000. Kumar was then arrested from the nearby Shakti area,” DCP Chaudhary said.
A 32-year-old Class 8 dropout, Kumar owned a shop in his village. He allegedly told the police that he provides mule accounts to one Gandhi Sanday for Rs 10,000 each. According to the police, it was Gandhi who called up the retired officer and bought the jewellery. “Gandhi works for a syndicate based out of Dubai and is still at large,” a police official said.
