The quantum of sentence will be pronounced on July 23
| Photo Credit: Reuters
A special Ranchi court on Saturday convicted five alleged cyber criminals hailing from Jharkhand’s Jamtara on money laundering charges.
The quantum of sentence will be pronounced on Tuesday.
The case is being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate (ED). Those held guilty under various provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act are Ganesh Mandal, 51; his son Pradeep Kumar Mandal, 30; Santosh Mandal, 51; and his sons Pintu Mandal, 33; and Ankush Kumar Mandal, 27; who are from Mirga village in Jamtara, which had recently gained notoriety for being a hub of cybercrime. They have been taken into custody.
The five are among a large number of cyber criminals in Jamtara who have been either arrested or are wanted by various enforcement agencies on the charge of cheating hundreds of people in different parts of the country by fraudulently obtaining details of their bank accounts, credit/debit cards, and one-time passwords for carrying out illegal fund transfers. In 2020, Netflix brought out a series named Jamtara on the same issue.
FIR filed in 2015
The instant case is based on a first information report registered on December 29, 2015, at the Narayanpur police station in Jamtara. The police filed a chargesheet on July 22, 2016, alleging that Pradeep, Pintu, Mukesh, Ganpati, Prakash, and Vishu Mandal indulged in illegal withdrawal and transfer of funds from the accounts of the victims, by posing as bank officials.
The ED found that the gang members would call the prospective victims and threaten them that their ATM cards/accounts would be blocked and then get their banking details. They would subsequently transfer funds from the victims’ accounts to e-wallets such as M-Pesa, PayTm, PhonePe, and Mobikwik.
The funds were then transferred to various bank accounts and then withdrawn. The cash was again deposited in the accounts operated by gang members from various parts of the country, including Barmer, Madhopur, Mansarovar and Jaipur in Rajasthan; Jharkhand’s NSC Bose railway station, Gomoh, Giridih and Dhanbad; various places in Delhi; Bhubaneshwar and Ranihat in Odisha; Mumbai and Pune in Maharashtra; and Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu. Almost all the money from most of the suspect accounts would be withdrawn.
According to the agency, Pradeep used to gather phone numbers of bank customers from the Internet and call them posing as a bank official to get the details. In about three years, he had raised close to ₹30 lakh using the modus operandi, it said. He was involved in the acquisition, concealment and transfer of proceeds of crime for construction of house, purchase of vehicles, and other activities. Pradeep’s father Ganesh had about ₹17 lakh in his one account and ₹7.71 lakh in another.
The ED collected details of over ₹9 lakh with respect to the accounts linked to Pintu, while nine such accounts related to Ankush had recorded credits totalling over ₹41 lakh.
Multiple phone numbers
The agency identified over 75 mobile numbers related to the accounts operated by Ankush that reflected transactions made through Immediate Payment Service/Person-to-Account Number/UPI/e-wallets. While 52 of them were registered with M-Pesa, 33 were on PhonePe and nine had been blacklisted at the instance of the Union Home Ministry for their use in suspected fraudulent activities.
The money laundering probe revealed that Ankush had created e-wallets in fictitious names on the basis of forged KYC details. Those accounts were used to receive large sums from other wallets and transfer funds to his own bank accounts for withdrawals in cash.
The fifth convict also had significant deposits in his account. Based on the findings, the agency had earlier attached assets worth ₹66 lakh in the same case in 2021.
During the probe, the agency recorded the statements of 13 persons, including some bank officials and the five gang members.
