Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh: The Cyber Crime Unit and Special Operations Group (SOG) of Sultanpur district have busted a large-scale online trading fraud, arresting seven accused from Assam and Mumbai. The gang allegedly duped investors of more than ₹2.75 crore by creating a cloned mobile application of a reputed trading company and luring people with promises of high returns in the stock market.
Superintendent of Police Kunwar Anupam Singh said the case came to light following a complaint by Bhasker Pandey, a resident of Shafipur. Pandey stated that he came across an advertisement on Facebook promising lucrative profits through share market investments. After filling in his details, he received a WhatsApp call from a woman identifying herself as Shruti Asati, who persuaded him to invest and added him to a WhatsApp group.
The group’s so-called teacher and proprietor, Daulat Jain, introduced an investment scheme through WhatsApp messages, assuring quick and high returns. To gain trust, the accused initially showed Pandey some profits before convincing him to invest a total of ₹10,11,689.75, which was never returned.
During investigation, police found that the fraud was carried out using a cloned app of the original company. Further probe revealed that the same gang had cheated Abhishek Singh of Amethi of around ₹85 lakh and Apnish Singh of Lucknow of approximately ₹1.85 crore. Separate cases were registered in the respective cyber crime police stations.
Tracing the money trail through KYC details, police found that the funds were transferred to accounts linked to Hanif Agro Traders, owned by Hanif Qazi, and Shamsuddin Ahmed, both based in Kamrup, Assam. A police team arrested Hanif Qazi and Shamsuddin Ahmed from Assam. During interrogation, they revealed that they had provided their bank accounts on the instructions of Shafikul Islam and Zakir Khan of Barpeta, Assam, in exchange for money.
All accused were brought to Sultanpur on transit remand. Meanwhile, another team sent to Mumbai detained three suspects based on technical analysis and informer inputs. They were identified as Santosh Surve from Bhiwandi, Vijay Ishwar Kalantre from Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra, and Farid Malik from Medinipur, West Bengal.
Police said further investigation is underway to identify more victims and uncover the wider network involved in the scam.
