With Kumbh Mela story, fake BBMP engineer cheats man of Rs 1.4 lakh

Bengaluru: A 54-year-old private firm employee residing in Banashankari fell prey to cybercrooks impersonating a BBMP engineer. They sought financial assistance to travel from Prayagraj to Bengaluru and deceived the man of Rs 1.4 lakh recently.

The victim, Sharan (name changed), in his complaint to Banashankari police, stated that one of his friends, Ramesh (name changed), received a phone call from 6232942019 on March 5. The caller spoke in Hindi. His friend, unable to understand the language, handed over the phone to Sharan, asking him to help.

Sharan spoke to the caller, who introduced himself as Venkatesh, a BBMP engineer. He said he was a friend of Ramesh and that he and his family had visited Prayagraj for Kumbh Mela. He further claimed they missed the flight and sought money to book tickets for another flight to Bengaluru. Sharan cross-checked with Ramesh if he knew an engineer named Venkatesh. When Ramesh confirmed he knew him, Sharan agreed to help. The fraudster said he would return the money once he reached Bengaluru. Sharan transferred money from his account through a digital payment application to the QR codes sent by the fraudster.

Sharan paid Rs 46,000 from one of his accounts and Rs 95,594 from another account, totalling Rs 1.4 lakh. The next day, they tried to reach the number to find if Venkatesh had landed in Bengaluru, but there was no response. They waited for a couple of days, and as they didn't get any call from ‘Venkatesh', they realised it was a fraud.

A case has been filed. A senior officer said the victim should have been suspicious when the caller spoke in Hindi instead of Kannada.