3 held for duping couple in name of lottery

The Worli police have arrested three persons for allegedly duping a couple to the tune of Rs3.25 lakh in the name of lottery.

The accused – Arshad Ali Sayyed (20), Jafar Abbas Hasmullah Sheikh (22) and Irfan Ali Miyan Ansari (32) – are all natives of Bihar. They told the couple that they had won a lottery of Rs25 lakh and asked them to pay some money to claim the prize. Interestingly, the victim received a call in this regard from Pakistan, making the police suspect that the racket was being operated through the neighbouring country.

According to the police, on May 15, a Worli-based housewife received a call from an unknown mobile number. The caller identified himself as Rajbeer and said her number has been selected as winner in a lottery.

The woman then informed her husband. Later, she received another call from one Vinod Kumar, who told her that in order to claim the prize money she would have to deposit some cash in various bank accounts. The victim followed the instructions and deposited Rs3.30 lakh in different bank accounts.

"When the victim kept receiving calls wherein she was asked to deposit even more money, she realised that she had been conned. She then lodged a police complaint. The call records showed that the calls were made from Pakistan. The probe further revealed that the beneficiary account holders were from Assam and the cash were withdrawn from ATMs in Kolkata. We nabbed one accused from Kolkata and two others were held from Gopal Ganj in Bihar," said an officer from the Worli police station.

He added, the trio was involved in only withdrawing cash from the ATMs in return for some commission. The police have seized over 200 debit cards of various banks from them. "It appears that the racket was being operated from Pakistan. As many as 42 mobile numbers have been revealed in our probe that are being used to dupe people in India," said the officer.