Man held for routing cybercrime funds through mule accounts

Bettiah: Police arrested a 32-year-old man for allegedly operating a cyberfraud racket by purchasing mule bank accounts and facilitating illegal transactions, police said on Sunday. During the raid, police recovered 28 ATM cards, 10 SIM cards, five bank passbooks, four cheque books and eight cellphones from his possession.

The accused, identified as Sandeep Kumar Gupta, a resident of Manglapur Gudaria ward no. 5 under Nauthan police station arrested, was arrested on Saturday following a raid conducted at his shop in Manglapur Bazar.


Superintendent of police Shaurya Suman said on Sunday that the Bettiah cyber police station received a tip-off that Gupta was procuring bank accounts and SIM cards to route funds obtained through cyberfraud. Acting on the information, a special team led by DSP (cybercrime), with assistance from Nauthan police, carried out a search operation on the premises.

According to the SP, preliminary investigation revealed that the accused used to purchase bank accounts and SIM cards for Rs4,000 to Rs5,000. Fraud proceeds were allegedly routed to these mule accounts, from which Gupta would retain a commission of 7-8% before transferring the remaining amount to other accounts through ATM cash deposit machines.

Police said transactions worth several lakh rupees were traced in the suspected accounts, which are also linked to multiple cybercrime complaints. A case has been registered under relevant sections of law, and the accused has been sent to judicial custody. The cyberpolice are probing the wider network and efforts are on to identify and arrest other persons involved in the racket.