AHMEDABAD: A 65-year-old man from the Anandnagar area of the city lost Rs 1.29 crore between March 28 and June 18 to a woman who befriended him on Facebook.
In his police complaint, he said that she and her aides extorted money from him by threatening to take legal action against him.
According to the case details, the retired employee of a cooperative firm, received a friend request on Facebook from the woman in Oct 2023.
She claimed to be living in London. He accepted the request and they began chatting and exchanged mobile numbers.
In early March, she told him that she had got her visa and would soon be coming to India to meet him.
On March 28, the complainant received a call from an unknown man who identified himself as an officer at Delhi airport. He told the complainant that his Facebook friend had been caught with £80,000.
The alleged officer told the complainant that he will have to pay the fine on behalf of his Facebook friend. He also threatened to implicate him in money-laundering and terror funding cases.
The complainant said he got scared and followed the caller's instructions.
According to the complaint, the man posing as officer took down his bank details and made him transfer Rs 1.29 crore between March 29 and June 18.
The complainant said that he later realised he had been duped and called the cybercrime helpline.
Anandnagar police registered a complaint of cheating and breach of trust on Thursday under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, along with charges under the Information Technology Act, and began an investigation.
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