Navi mumbai man duped of Rs 1.09 crore in online stock trading scam

George Mendonca

Navi Mumbai: A 51-year-old man, a logistician residing in New Panvel, was duped of Rs 1.09 crore in an online stock market trading scam after a cybercheats gang, including a woman, offered him high returns on his investment by buying shares of a leading financial services company, for which he was even sent the said company's SEBI registration number to gain his trust. The fraud was committed between March 26 and June 3.

On the morning of March 26, the complainant saw an advertisement about the company on his social media account with a link for investing in online share trading, promising high returns. He clicked on the link and was added to a WhatsApp group. The group admins were R Venkat Raman and Tina Malhotra. He messaged Malhotra on WhatsApp for more information on share trading, after which she provided him with information and sent a link to register his DMA (Direct Market Access) account as a trading member. He was made to fill in his personal information, and she sent him a DMA account registration form with the Sebi registration number of the company on WhatsApp. Her aide, Raman, was guiding him on the WhatsApp group to buy shares. He was also made to download the app by sending a link.

On April 2, he started online stock trading as guided by Raman, and he was made to transfer investment money to a bank account, claiming it was with SEBI. As his profit was being virtually displayed on the app, he traded further. From April 2 to June 1, as per the tips given by Raman in the WhatsApp group, he gradually transferred a total of Rs 1.09 crore to different bank account numbers provided by Customer Service for various purposes, such as share purchases, block trading, IPO purchases, brokerage, taxes, and security deposits.

On June 1, when the complainant was unable to withdraw his profit amount displayed on the app, he questioned Malhotra via WhatsApp message, but she did not respond to his repeated messages. Hence, on June 3, he went to the Andheri office of the company to meet Malhotra, but he was told that no such employee worked with the company. Also, there was no DMA account registered in his name in this company. Realising that he was cheated by scamsters, he lodged an online complaint on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCCRP) on Friday, after which an FIR was registered at Navi Mumbai Cyber police station on the same day, and the accused were booked for cheating and criminal breach of trust, among other BNS sections and the IT Act.

Vishal Patil, senior inspector of Navi Mumbai Cyber police station, said, "We have initiated the process of tracing the bank accounts where the complainant was made to transfer money, for freezing those bank accounts. The scamsters initially make their targets transfer money to a bank account and then carry out multiple transfers from that account to other bank accounts across India."