JOIN USKodagu police arrested three people on Monday night for cheating people through online fraud.
The fraudsters were convincing people to invest money in a Ponzi scheme on the allurement of earning double the amount invested.
John (45), a real estate businessman and a resident of third block in Tyagaraja Colony of Kushalnagar, Shashikanth (37), sales executive at BSM Motors and a resident of Shivarama Karanth Extension and Antony D’Cunha (39), manager at Diwan Housing Finance and a resident of Basaveshwara Extension in Kushalnagar, are the arrested. Four other accused from Kodagu are absconding.
Addressing reporters in Madikeri on Tuesday, Superintendent of Police Dr Suman D Pennekar said that the network was active in the state and transactions worth Rs 15 crore to Rs 20 crore were made. The accused had developed a website capitalrelations.in through a Bengaluru-based company by investing Rs 1.50 lakh and around 3,500 people had invested money.
Shashikanth, the accused, was the administrator and those who wanted to make an investment had to contact him and obtain user ID, password and three e-pins. An amount of Rs 1,000 was fixed for a single e-pin.
The amount would go to the accounts of the accused. A separate user login was provided for the invested. The money was transferred using Google Pay, Phone Pay and Net Banking.
The investors were told that after seven days, the amount will get doubled and will be credited to the investors. A few people had received the money but a lot of investors were cheated, the SP said and added that the transaction was totally illegal.