Bhubaneswar: Two Noida-based fraudsters were sentenced to ten years rigorous imprisonment in Rs 2 crore cheating case.
An OPID court in Balasore also imposed a fine of Rs 3 lakh each, failing which they would undergo further imprisonment of two years each.
The accused persons namely Bijay Bharadwaj and Himanshu Bhandari were held guilty under sections 419/420/465/467/468/471/ 170/120-B IPC, Sec.66 (C) & 66 (D) of IT Act.
The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Odisha police had arrested the duo based on the complaint of a businessman Pramod Kumar Rout of Joda in Keonjhar. He alleged that the scammers cheated him of Rs.2.35
Crores on the pretext of paying him Rs 3 Crores from the Govt. of India, under ‘Pradhan Mantri Rahat Kosh Yojana’ against his Insurance Policy with Max New York Life, using the forged and manipulated documents.
Complainant Rout had one policy in Max New York Life Insurance Company. In 2019, he received a call from a fraudster impersonating himself as A. K Walia, the Fund Releasing Head, Ministry of Finance, Govt. of India. He informed Rout that his insurance policy has been selected for a reward under “Pradhan Mantri Rahat Kosh Yojona” of Govt. of India and an amount of Rs.3 Crores will be released to his account.
Subsequently, he received one letter on WhatsApp, which was issued purportedly by one HOD (Insurance Regulatory & Development Authority of India (IRDA) that the complainant is required to pay some dues for receiving fund of Rs 1,56,36,500 within the next four hours.
Along with the above letter, the informant also received some other communications/photographs on WhatsApp.
Rout received a series of calls from different persons using different mobile numbers, who identified themselves as employees in the office of A.K. Walia and induced/ persuaded the informant to transfer money through RTGS for the release of Rs 3 Crore.
Being induced, he transferred around Rs 2.35 crores in installments believing that after these procedures, he would get the Reward Money but no amount was received.
Later, he realised that he had been cheated by the fraudsters. He lodged a complaint with the EOW.
