Cyber crook, 2 aides dupe Kamothe man of Rs 2 crore, held

NAVI MUMBAI: A 32-year-old cyber criminal and his two aides were arrested by Navi Mumbai crime cell team for defrauding a Kamothe man of Rs 2.24 crore after the kingpin, posing as an employee of Integrated Grievance Management System (IGMS), online consumer complaints registration system created by IRDA, offered to help him get his maturity sum on his Rs 8 lakh insurance policy that had lapsed during Covid, said police.Gajanan Kale, senior inspector of cyber crime cell, said, "The arrested accused include Prashant Chamoli (32) alias Deepak Bansal, who hails from Gurugram, Parvez Sharif (41), a cloth seller and Ranjit Tiwari (32), a money transfer agent, both hail from New Delhi. The complainant's life insurance policy has lapsed during Covid due to non-payment of premiums. Hence, he had submitted an application on the website of IGMS seeking payment of his lapsed life insurance policy as per the norms of the IRDA."He added, "It seems like the data of IGMS for leaked and the key accused Chamoli targeted the complainant, who was defrauded of Rs 2.24 crore. In August 2020, Chamoli used a fake identity as Deepak Bansal and contacted the complainant by posing as IGMS employee and told him he could help to get the maturity amount of his lapsed insurance policy. Accordingly, he gradually made the complainant to transfer money to several bank accounts in Gurugram and Delhi. Initially, the complainant was made to transfer a small sum of Rs 2 lakh and assured that it will be reimbursed with the maturity amount. Thereafter, the fraudster kept demanding him to transfer more money and the complainant ended up paying Rs 2.24 crore till July 2023 as he believed that the caller was genuinely from IGMS. He further said, " As the complainant did not receive payment for three years and the fraudster became incommunicado, he lodged a complaint at Kamothe police station, where an FIR of cheating was registered against the accused."The senior inspector further added,"During the probe, it was found that out of the complainant's defrauded Rs 2.24 crore, a total of 1.80 crore was transferred to a Gurugram bank account of Chamoli. Our team reached Gurugram and arrested Chamoli, then it was learnt that he had used a fake identity as Deepak Bansal and contacted the complainant. We seized five mobile phones, five SIM cards, a visa debit card and a passport from him. During interrogation in police custody remand, he revealed the names of his two aides Sharif and Tiwari, who had provided him five SIM cards and several bank accounts for transferring the payment by the complainant. Both were arrested from Delhi on August 31. The three accused are in police custody till September 7. The key accused Chamoli has committed similar crimes by targeting several others."