Nagpur: Cyber crooks cheated a businessman from Nagpur of Rs 2.50 crore on the pretext of providing higher returns in the stock market, said police.
The essence wholesaler became the latest victim of a complex online scam and lost over Rs 2.48 crore to cyber crooks within two months.
The victim, Moti Kishanchand Dularamani (76), a resident of 93, Tatva Apartment, Canal Road, Ramdaspeth and a former wholesaler of flavouring essence in the country, lodged a complaint with the police that he came across an ad on Facebook in November 2023. The ad promised 15 to 20 percent profit on investment in the stock market and sent a link to him. After he clicked on the link, he joined a WhatsApp group — Stock Frontline — and started communicating with the members. They then convinced him to open a demat account by promising huge returns on share trading.
Presuming them to be genuine share brokers, Dularamani invested Rs 2.75 crore between November 11, 2023 and January 8, 2024 using the link sent by them. To gain his confidence, the fraudsters transferred Rs 26.31 lakh in his demat account. After a few days, he contacted the group members as he was unable to withdraw more money from his demat account. The WhatsApp group members told him that his demat account was to be re-activated.
Later, Dularamani realised that he was defrauded to the tune of Rs 2,48,69,000 and approached the police. On his complaint, Cyber Police registered a case under Sections 419, 420,467,468, 471, 34 of the IPC, read with Section 66(d) of Information Technology Act and initiated investigation.
