10 arrested in Pune-based fake college admission racket targeting parents

The MumbaiPolice arrested 10 people for allegedly running two bogus call centres in Pune and cheating parents by promising to secure admissions for their children in prominent educational institutions, with the accused linked to at least six cases across Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Gujarat.

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Police said they seized property worth ₹1.35 crore. Two high-end cars allegedly belonging to the main accused — a BMW, a Jaguar and a Maruti Suzuki Ciaz — were registered in the names of other people. Police also seized ₹24 lakh from a bank account allegedly used to receive proceeds of the fraud.

A case was registered against two of the accused at the Powai Police Station on August 13, 2026, under Sections 318(4) and 319(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.

Gracy Peter Gwami, 47, a resident of Shiv Om Society in Gokhale Nagar in Mumbai, came in contact with the accused after responding to an advertisement on an Instagram page named ‘techorbit1111’. The accused allegedly claimed to facilitate her son’s admission into IIT Hyderabad through an NRI or management quota. Police said the accused took the complainant to the IIT Hyderabad campus and claimed they had good connections to secure the admission. The accused allegedly sought payments of ₹2 lakh to ₹3 lakh at a time towards a deposit, advance and first-year academic fees, eventually collecting ₹16.50 lakh from her. A few days after the accused received the total amount, they switched off their phones, following which the complainant approached the police. As soon as the case was registered, the police contacted the bank and the defrauded money was frozen.

Police raided the two alleged call centres in Pune, located in Lohegaon and Kharadi, on August 14, 2026. They arrested 10 accused and seized a total of 22 mobile phones, 23 SIM cards, two hard disks, two laptops, seven debit cards of different banks, and documents with names and mobile numbers of colleges and other institutes.

Police also seized three cars allegedly belonging to the main accused — a BMW, a Jaguar and a Maruti Suzuki Ciaz — which they said were registered in the names of other people.

Police also seized ₹24 lakh from the main accused’s bank account that was used to receive the proceeds of the fraud. The total value of property seized in the case was ₹1.35 crore, police said.

Datta Nalawade, Deputy Commissioner of Police, West Zone 3, Mumbai, said the accused operated from two call centres in Pune and had engineering backgrounds. “This cheating case was being run from two call centres in Pune, where they would contact victims, keep conversations and engage them until they could extract the maximum amount of money from the victims. Five of the 10 accused are B. Tech graduates, and the other five also have some engineering background, so they had knowledge about the admission process and knew all the technical terms needed to convince people,” Mr. Nalawade said.

Police said the main accused had allegedly been operating the admission racket from Lohegaon since 2019 and subsequently recruited others into the operation from 2024.

Of the 22 phones seized, 13 were recovered from the main accused. Police said five devices had allegedly been purchased using money obtained from the complainant.

Analysis of the devices led the police to the alleged call centre in Lohegaon, which was subsequently raided.

The main accused was produced before a local court on August 15, 2026, where he was remanded to police custody till August 20, 2026. Police said they have so far linked the accused to six cases — one each in Mumbai, Nagpur, Karnataka and Gujarat, and two in Uttar Pradesh.

The evidence also included a list of 30 mobile numbers and names of educational institutions, including Pune Institute of Computer Technology, Netaji Subhas University of Technology, and Delhi Technological University. Police are investigating whether more people were cheated using similar methods.