Conman held on charge of duping courier firm by exchanging parcels containing gold bars

Pune: An alert delivery person of a courier firm in Moshi recently foiled a man's attempt to swap two parcels containing gold bars worth Rs 3 lakh with identical-looking dummy parcels.The delivery person noticed discrepancies in the parcels, alerted his colleagues immediately, and handed over the accused to the Bhosari MIDC police.The accused, identified as Dhiraj Kumar Gupta, a resident of Nalanda in Bihar, has been booked under sections 318 (cheating) and 319 (cheating by personation) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). He was remanded to five days of police custody.Police sub-inspector Balaji Jonapalle of Bhosari MIDC police told TOI that Gupta had ordered two gold bars worth Rs 3 lakh from an e-commerce company using a woman's name and paid for the order online."On Feb 6, around 2pm, the delivery person contacted the woman to confirm the delivery address. She provided an address in Moshi. When the delivery person reached the location, a man approached him claiming the woman was his relative and had sent him to collect the parcel," Jonapalle said.The officer said the delivery person handed over the parcels and asked for the OTP. However, when the man began avoiding sharing the OTP, the delivery person tried contacting the woman, but her phone was not reachable."The delivery person grew suspicious and told the man to return the parcel. The man returned it, saying he would cancel the order. On checking, the executive realised the parcels had been replaced with a duplicate," Jonapalle said.The delivery person alerted his colleagues, who brought the accused to the police station. "On examining the duplicate parcels, we found them to be empty," the officer added.During interrogation, Gupta admitted to placing the order using his wife's name. After receiving the call from the delivery executive, he switched off the registered mobile phone so the OTP could not be delivered."His plan was to exchange the original parcels with dummy ones, retain the gold bars, and later cancel the order to get a refund," Jonapalle said.The officer said investigations have revealed that Gupta's daughter is studying at a Pune-based college, and he had travelled from Bihar to Pune to carry out the fraud. "We are investigating whether anyone else was involved in the crime," he added.