Network vanishes thrice in a day, Ahmedabad man loses Rs 14 lakh

AHMEDABAD: A 34-year-old man from the Gota area of the city on Wednesday filed a complaint with Cybercrime police alleging that he lost Rs 14 lakh in around 24 hours between June 17 and June 18 to cybercrooks.
Mahendra Sadhu, a realty developer, said that he never shared his banking details with anyone, and the only thing that happened was that he lost his mobile network thrice during which the transactions took place.
Sadhu said that he had contacted Cybercrime helpline after he first lost Rs 8 lakh on June 18.
After a few hours, cybercrooks withdrew Rs 6 lakh more from his bank account.
In his FIR with Cybercrime police, Sadhu said that he had first received a missed call from an unknown number on 11.30am on June 17 after which his mobile network snapped.
Sadhu immediately approached his sim service provider VI store and enquired about the network. Sadhu was told that someone impersonating him had called up the customer care and requested to deactive the sim claiming that it was stolen.
On Sadhu’s request, VI activated his sim card and he found that no financial transactions had taken place.
On June 18 at around 2pm, Sadhu found that his sim card was deactivated again. He again approached a VI store and was told that someone again got his sim card deactivated, saying that it was stolen. This time, Sadhu found that Rs 8 lakh were debited from his bank account.
He got his sim activated again and approached the Cybercrime helpline and registered a complaint of fraud. After a couple of hours on June 18, his sim was deactivated again and he lost Rs 6 lakh to cybercrooks.
Sadhu approached Cybercrime police and filed a complaint of cheating by impersonation, cheating and criminal conspiracy under the IPC along with the charges of the Information Technology Act.