District Cyber Crime Cops arrest two from Maharashtra; prime accused absconding, says SP Mallikarjun Baladandi
Mysuru, June 2 (BLU&BS)- The District Cyber Crime Police have busted a major racket of inter-State cyber fraudsters, who had swindled a whopping Rs. 189.49 crore, through fraudulent means, by luring gullible jewellers through social media networks, offering gold bars at a lesser price, across the country.
Deploying the similar modus operandi, the racketeers, identified as Amit Singh alias Ani, from Punjab, Yatin Ramesh Jain and Mohammed Shadab Anjum from Maharashtra, had allegedly cheated Jitendra Kumar Khandelwal, a jeweller from K.R. Nagar in Mysuru district, in a meticulous manner.
While the prime accused Amit is on the run, the remaining two accused were arrested by a team of District Cyber Crime Police Inspector S.P. Sunil, in Maharashtra. They were produced before a Court here.
The arrests were carried out in a coordinated investigation conducted by the District Cyber Police and the Police personnel attached to K.R. Nagar Police station and those handling Central Equipment Identity Register (CEIR) Portal, to trace lost or stolen cell phones.
196 cyber complaints
Superintendent of Police (SP) Mallikarjun Baladandi told media persons at a press conference convened at his office auditorium here this morning, about 196 cyber crime complaints have been booked against 56 bank accounts being operated by the gang in different States, with the amount of money defrauded estimated at Rs. 189 crore and 48 lakhs.
Acting on the complaint of K.R. Nagar jeweller Khandelwal, on Jan. 27 this year, the Cyber Police had registered the case under Section 66 (D) of IT Act and BNS Sections 318 (4) and 319 (2).
Modus operandi
Khandelwal, who came in contact with the accused through WhatsApp, came in the words of the latter, who had offered to sell gold at the discounted rate of Rs. 600 per gram. He had credited Rs. 13.69 lakh to the bank accounts of the racketeers towards 100 grams of gold, he intended to buy from them. However, the accused went underground without supplying the gold, it is stated in the complaint.
Explaining about the modus operandi of this racket, SP Baladandi said, the accused targeted daily wage labourers and others, collected their bank account details and ATM cards, only to deceive the victims.
12 cases in State
In Karnataka alone, the accused were wanted in 12 cases, including the one in Mysuru district and were wanted in similar fraud cases reported across the country including Bihar, Odisha, Maharashtra and other States, said SP Baladandi.
The Police team, which cracked the case, acted under the guidance of SP Mallikarjun Baladandi, Additional SP-1 C. Mallick and Additional SP-2 L. Nagesh. The investigation team consisted of CEN Dy.SP R. Srikanth, Cyber Crime Inspector S.P. Suneel, PSI R. Lakshmi and staff S. Manjunath, H.V. Rangaswamy, G.S. Abhishek and C.N. Mahesh, with the officers handling CEIR Portal involved in tracking the accused.
This post was published on June 2, 2026 7:30 pm