No banking frauds in Tamil Nadu? NCRB data says so
CHENNAI: The newly released data of the National Crime Records Bureau shows certain category of banking frauds as nil in TN leaving state police baffled. The data does not reflect hundreds of complaints lodged at bank fraud division at the Chennai city police commissioner’s office in Vepery. A senior police officer, who is attached to the Bank Fraud division said, “We had handed over the data long back and it was definitely not zero. There were FIRs filed, accused arrested. Something might have gone wrong while uploading the data by the NCRB officials. We have raised the issue.”
On January, 19, 2018, 71-year-old R Jayalakshmi, a resident of AF Block in Anna Nagar died of cardiac arrest soon after `90,000 from her account was swindled by conmen, who contacted her over phone and asked her to provide her Aadhaar, bank account number and the one-time passwords. The men, who are still at large, had contacted Jayalakshmi on January 19 at around 2.30. The man had sought bank details claiming that her ATM card was going to expire. After she divulge the details, `90,000 vanished from her account.
On June 11, 2018, a 36-year-old woman lost around `1.5 lakh after a man told her that her ATM card was blocked and needs the card details. A complaint was lodged at the Bank Fraud division of the Central Crime Branch and the then inspector Selvarani, told Express that locations of mobile numbers were traced to Bihar and UP.
Speaking to Express, a senior police officer who was re-transferred from CCB, said, “Atleast 20 to 30 cases of ATM fraud like skimmers, OTP frauds and online banking fraud where the conmen swindle money using phishing emails would be received at the commissioner’s office everyday. While we trace location it is difficult to arrest as they keep moving. We register FIRs for almost all cases.” The data is in contrast with many other states reporting such cases in ‘Crime in India, 2018.’ Express tried to contact the Director of NCRB and Directorate of the department through e-mails and calls for clarification but there was no response.