Five persons of a gang were arrested for allegedly duping people on the pretext of providing them confirmed tickets of bus or trains, the police said on Monday.
The accused have been identified as Sanjay Yadav (40), a resident of Sultanpuri, Lal Babu Sahani (27), a resident of Samaypur Badli, Santosh Kumar (27), a resident of Badali, Rakesh Mandal (26) and Rajeev Mandal (22), residents of Shakurpur, they said.
The police said one Sanjay Kumar lodged a complaint on October 6 at Mahendra Park police station where he said that on October 5, he, along with his 15-year-old son, had come to Singhu Border from Rai, Sonipat to go to his hometown in Barabanki, U.P.
They boarded an e-rickshaw from Singhu Border to ISBT, Kashmere Gate. Meanwhile, three more passengers also boarded on the e-rickshaw. They pretended that they were also going to Lucknow and started befriending the complainant.
The accused asked Kumar for train or bus tickets and when he said that he was not having any ticket, they asked him to come with them to a bus ticket booking office at Jahangirpuri, an officer said.
ATM pin number
A person, posing as ticket agent, came and they asked the complainant to give them his ATM card and pin number to buy the tickets. Kumar gave his ATM card and pin number to his son and sent him with them to buy the tickets, the officer said.
One person remained with Kumar and after 20 minutes, he told the complainant that he was going to check whether tickets had been booked or not, the police said. Thereafter, Kumar received messages on his phone regarding withdrawal of ₹68,500 from his account.
Kumar started looking for his son and found that he had reached his home in Rai, Sonipat. His son said that the accused had asked the pin of the ATM from him, withdrawn money and fled, the police said.
“During investigation, the police found CCTV footage of the accused persons. On Saturday around 4.30 pm, all five accused were apprehended from a near Haiderpur metro station,” Deputy Commissioner of Police (North-West) Vijayanta Arya said.
During interrogation, the accused said that during festive seasons, commuting of people from Haryana, Punjab, Delhi to Bihar and U.P. increase and the victims easily trapped by them as they were in dire need of confirmed tickets, the DCP said.
One laptop, ₹13,500, 42 mobile phones and other things were recovered from their possession, the police said, adding that the accused persons disclosed their involvements in a number of cases.