Mumbai: A 56-year-old woman working as an accountant lost nearly Rs1 crore in a share investment fraud.
About The Case
According to the MBVV police, the complainant, a Vasai resident employed at a private firm in Andheri, received a WhatsApp message on February 9 inviting her to join a group offering stock market tips and promising high returns. She clicked the join button, after which her number was added to the group.
A scammer posing as a market analyst shared a link in the group, asking members to download a trading app. The woman complied and opened a trading account through the bogus platform. Between March 18 and April 16, she transferred nearly Rs 1 crore across 39 online transactions to bank accounts provided by the scammers.
Lured by promises of large profits, she even redeemed her fixed deposits to invest further, police said. Her trading app showed alleged earnings of Rs 10.65 crore. When she tried to withdraw the money, the scammer told her she needed to pay an additional Rs 48 lakh in taxes.
Despite following the withdrawal procedures, she couldn’t access her funds. Realising she had been duped, she lodged a complaint with the police last week under sections 318 (cheating) of Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and sections 66C (identity theft), 66D (cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act.
