Easy money, hard fall: Teen held in 3 crore forex racket

Raipur: Police arrested an 18-year-old prime accused behind an interstate forex fraud racket that duped a city-based tour operator of Rs 19.47 lakh. The gang, operating across multiple states, is suspected to have carried out at least 22 scams, cheating victims of nearly Rs 3 crore, with several more members reported absconding. The arrest followed a probe into a high-profile fraud involving the city-based tour operator.Hardeep Singh Hora, who resides in Guru Nanak Nagar and owns a travel agency, filed a complaint at Telibandha police station saying he received a call from an unknown number on WhatsApp on March 1. Identifying himself as Harshit Agarwal, the caller requested hotel bookings in the US and UK.On March 2, the same caller rang up the travel operator, asking him to come to a co-working space at Currency Tower, Telibandha. He also instructed him to bring 18,000 USD and 2,000 GBP. The caller told Hardeep that his brother, Rakshit Agarwal, would provide him the equivalent amount in Indian currency at the rendezvous point. At the office, a person posing to be Rakshit left the cabin on the pretext of fetching a cash-counting machine, even as Harshit kept Hardeep engaged over the phone.The accused then allegedly fled with the foreign currency, valued at approximately Rs 19.47 lakh. A joint team of the Anti-Crime and Cyber Unit and Telibandha police arrested two individuals — Prosenjit Chakraborty (38) from Howrah, West Bengal, and Mayank Sharma (24) from Rewari, Haryana — in connection with the case.