Two individuals have been apprehended for their suspected roles in a mule scheme that involved establishing fictitious companies and associated mule accounts to facilitate transactions of money obtained through illegal activities, according to police reports. The operation was reportedly led by a branch manager from a nationalized bank.
On Sunday, the cyber division of the state CID arrested Himanshu Solanki, 32, and Praveen Kumar, 29, in Faridabad, Haryana, for allegedly producing counterfeit documents, such as Aadhaar and PAN cards, and for setting up bogus companies under those identities.
“Bank accounts were opened against those fake companies where their ill-gotten gains were transferred,” said an officer.
Mule accounts are bank accounts used to facilitate illegal transactions by receiving and transferring funds from illicit activities, regardless of whether the account holders are complicit.
Funds from fake companies established by the suspects were reportedly directed to the bank accounts of the branch manager and his wife, according to a senior officer.
The suspects have been placed in police custody for 12 days following a court ruling in Hooghly.
In February, a branch manager from a nationalized bank was arrested by the Bengal CID in connection with this case for allegedly establishing mule accounts that were used to embezzle money from individuals misled into an investment scam.
The fraud came to light earlier this year when a resident of Chandernagore in Hooghly reported being swindled out of several lakhs after investing in cryptocurrency, prompted by a social media advertisement.
During the investigation, authorities discovered that the money invested by the Chandernagore resident had been transferred to various e-wallets linked to multiple private limited companies, which in turn were associated with bank accounts in Haryana, Delhi, Punjab, and other regions in western India.
“Transactions in crores were spotted in these bank accounts. While doing a deep analysis of these accounts, we found that in the second layer of transfers, several bank accounts in Birbhum, Murshidabad, South and North 24-Parganas were found to be involved. Out of these, at least six bank accounts in a particular branch in Birbhum were in the name of one person who later turned out to be the branch manager of a bank in Murshidabad,” said a senior officer of the state CID.
CID investigators discovered that the bank manager was among those who directly benefited from the criminal proceeds. Additionally, police reported that the two individuals arrested from Haryana had also received diverted funds in their mule accounts.
Cloned Website
Authorities revealed that a well-known gold jewelry store’s website was replicated to deceive the franchisee under the guise of the company.
On Sunday, the state CID apprehended 30-year-old Hariom Singh from Mathura, Uttar Pradesh, in connection with the case. CID officials stated that Singh allegedly created a bank account using fraudulent Aadhaar information and transferred the money obtained through the franchisee scam.
“The total defrauded amount is around ₹29 lakh. The accused executed the fraud by opening a fake website in the name of a reputable jewellery store, assuring the victims a franchise agreement,” a police officer said.
The accused has been remanded to police custody for seven days.
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