NEW DELHI: A group of fraudsters were arrested for allegedly procuring PAN details of as many as 90 celebrities including Bollywood actors Abhishek Bachchan, Madhuri Dixit and former India cricket captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni and getting credit cards issued through them, an official said on Friday.
The accused, identified as Sunil Kumar (32), Puneet (25), Md Asif (32), Vishwa Bhaskar Sharma (42) and Pankaj Mishra (37), got multiple credit cards issued in the name of celebrities and used the money for personal expenses.
Joint Commissioner of Police (eastern range) Chhaya Sharma said a complaint was lodged by an authorised representative of a Pune-based tech company having ‘One Card’ project wherein contactless metal credit cards and virtual cards were provided.
The complainant alleged that accused people have cheated their company to the tune of Rs 21.32 lakh by creating fake Pan Card and Aadhar card of many celebrities.
Accordingly, the police registered a case under relevant sections of law. During investigation, a police team was formed which collected the alleged IP addresses from one card credit card company, device ID of accused persons, IPDR of alleged 95 mail ID’s, call records and details of bank accounts.
“It was revealed that the said fraud was conducted by a gang of Delhi and Jaipur based persons who worked together in close conspiracy,” said Sharma.
She said after technical analysis, a raid was conducted and accused, Sunil Kumar was arrested. On interrogation, he disclosed that he learnt the techniques from Vishwa Bhaskar Sharma, hailing from Rajasthan.
Thereafter, he met another co-accused Pankaj Mishra who impersonated himself as Abhishek Bachchan and disclosed that they divided the cheated amount. Subsequently a raid was conducted, and Puneet and Md. Asif were nabbed.
Another raid was conducted in Jaipur where the other two co-accused were arrested. Various mobile phones, laptop, forged Pan and Aadhar Cards, SIM were recovered.
“It was revealed that till date accused persons have together cheated multiple loan apps, banks and credit card companies and spoiled the CIBIL score of many celebrities,” the official said.
Police cracked case through data
During investigation, the police collected the IP addresses from a card credit card company, device IDs of the five accused persons,IPDR of 95 email addresses,call records and details of bank accounts to be able to crack the case