Hyderabad: Police arrest 9 from fake Telugu call centre posing as ecommerce employees

One Keloth Kishan, a resident of Ibrahimpatnam in Telangana, filed a complaint after he was scammed into sending ₹48,200 to the accused, who impersonated officials of the ecommerce firm Naaptol and offered the victim a “Mahindra XUV car” worth ₹8.2 lakh in a lucky draw.

Based on his complaint, a case was registered and a special team was formed. This team raided three call centres on Wednesday, with the help of the Kolkata Police.

The police had already raided a villa within the Cyberabad Commissioner’s limit 15 days ago, and arrested three people. It was revealed during their questioning that the main branch was in West Bengal

Kingpins and small fry

The nine people arrested on Wednesday included the mastermind of the racket Uttam Kumar Yadav (21) from Bihar.

The others were Mudavath Ramesh, Jarupula Shankar, L Raju, K Ramchander, Mukesh Kumar, K Jagan Mohan Reddy, Orse Chandu and Gadhe Srisailam, all from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

Uttam Kumar, the kingpin, and the gang that duped several persons. (Supplied)

Rachakonda Police Commissioner Mahesh Bhagwat said the gang was operating call centres in West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, and Mumbai in an organised manner, and cheating people on the pretext of providing personal loans, jobs, lotteries or gifts, redeeming credit card reward points, and KYC updating, among other things.

Kumar, the kingpin, had been operating the call centres since 2017, and had duped several persons, said the cops.

To easily convince the victims to part with their money, Yadav hired executives who were fluent in regional languages.

They hired people from Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, and other states on a commission of 30 percent for each task assigned to them.

The executives would call the victims, explain them a lottery system, and convince them to pay to claim the prize, the police commissioner said.

The gang collected customer information from data providers such as Just Dial and Facebook ads. They then sent envelopes or letters containing scratch cards to the victims saying they had won a lottery. The scratch cards would reveal a big cash prize or a Mahindra XUV.

The “winners” would then be asked to deposit money — towards GST, registration, delivery charges, security deposits, and so on — to claim the vehicle.

After collecting the amount, the gang would switch off the mobile phone and stop all communications with the victim, said the cops

Articles seized

The Rachkonda police, along with a cash amount of ₹1.62 lakh and a Mahindra XVU 300 worth ₹12 lakh. They also found five laptops, 39 mobile phones, 16 debit cards, 121 letters with Naaptol letterheads, and scratch cards.

Four vehicle registrations, a driving license, and a PAN card were also retrieved, even as ₹2,88,841 — including cryptocurrency — was frozen in bank accounts.

The accused are currently being questioned to identify the money trail, the total fraud amount, and details of other victims and other people involved in the crime.