2 held for cheating using fake job offers, 'hired' ATM cards

Tikamgarh (MP): Two persons, suspected to be a part of an inter-state gang, have been arrested for allegedly duping people on pretext of offering them call centre jobs and pocketing their money through fraudulence means, police said today. The duo had adopted a unique way of acquiring money from gullible job seekers wherein they used 'hired ATM' cards to withdraw money, they said. The accused were identified as Kundan Kumar (22), a resident of Musallapur in Patna, and Ashok Yadav (30), a native of Neemkheda here. "We have arrested two youths, one of them was held from Patna and the other from here yesterday.

It is suspected that they are a part of an inter-state gang. They use to hire ATM cards from people on a 'monthly rent' basis to transact money they received from customers," SDO (Police) Neetesh Bhargava said. Elucidating the modus operandi, the SDO said the accused used to first put advertisement of 'work from home and earn money' and asked job seekers to call on the phone number mentioned. Meanwhile, they took ATM cards from people with zero or low balance in their accounts on a 'monthly rent' of Rs 5,000-10,000. "After being contacted by job seekers, they asked them to deposit money on name of 'processing fee' in 'fake' bank accounts.

After deposit the money, the amount was transferred to the bank accounts linked to the hired ATM cards. They later withdrew money using these hired ATM cards once the money was transferred from fake bank accounts to operative ones," Bhargava said. Police have recovered four ATM cards from the duo and it was found that they transacted over Rs 25 lakh using these AMT cards during the last fortnight, the official added. "It is suspected that these youth are a part of a 40- member gang that runs a call centre in Patna and deceit people through 'work from home' advertisements," he added.

According to police, the gang was working in separate cells comprising one that duped people by responding to job calls and asked them to deposit 'processing fee', another used to transfer money from fake accounts to operative ones. The third cell of the gang was engaged in withdrawal of the money through the 'hired' ATM cards and deposited the same to bank accounts of other gang members, he added. Bhargava said the turnover of the gang is over Rs 3 crores per month as their network is spread across several states. "We are investigating further and have sent police teams to Patna. These gang members were not in contact with each other over phone," he added.