Retired Government Official duped for Rs.2.54 crore: 3 held

The Gautam Budh Nagar cybercrime police arrested three people on Tuesday for allegedly defrauding a retired government officer in Noida of 2.54 crore under the guise of online trading, police said on Wednesday.

The complainant, Anil Sharma, is a retired central government official who was lured into a forex trading website called www.lexatrade.com, according to police.

“The con artists contacted him via video call and duped him into doubling his investments. They initially returned 15 lakh to Sharma’s bank account to gain his trust. Sharma then invested more money, but he was unable to get any returns and he ended up losing Rs.2.54 crore,” Reeta Yadav, in charge of the Cyber Crime police station said.

On March 24, a FIR was filed in the case after Sharma filed a complaint at the Cyber Crime police station. Vijay Sharma (56), Hemant Singharia (30), and Tarun Kashyap (35) were the three suspects apprehended on Tuesday. They are Delhi residents.

However, during the investigation, it was discovered that the main suspect, who has yet to be identified and arrested, accessed the bank accounts into which the defrauded money was transferred from Dubai.

“The police investigation discovered that the gang had taken some shops in Delhi for rent and had fake firms registered on the shop addresses. They then opened bank accounts in the name of the firm, and when the GST number was investigated for each firm, 15 to 20 bank accounts were found to have been opened,” the officer said.

She went on to say that while Vijay was in charge of opening bank accounts, Hemant was in charge of getting the fake firms registered for GST, and Tarun was in charge of getting the firms’ GST numbers.

“The main suspect, who accessed these accounts from Dubai and has yet to be identified, gave Vijay 1 lakh for each account he created. Hemant and Tarun were tasked with distributing the 1 lakh provided to Vijay,” Yadav added.

The suspects have been charged with cheating, forgery, and violating relevant sections of the IT Act.

“On Tuesday, the suspects were brought before the court and placed in judicial custody. An additional investigation is underway,” the officer stated.