Betting Racket Bust In Ghaziabad; 7 Arrested

7 members of an online gaming and betting racket were apprehended in Ghaziabad on August 24, Thursday. Police believe they are holding Rs 200 crore of scamming exploits and recovered 70 bank accounts with transactions amounting to as big as Rs 150 crore.

The incident came into light when Ritesh, a Kavi Nagar resident and a victim of this racket, filed an FIR against the accused who cheated him of Rs 69,500. The FIR was filed under sections 420 (cheating), 406 (criminal breach of trust), 467 (forgery), 468 (forgery for cheating), 471 (using as genuine a forged document) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC and relevant sections of the IT Act at Kavi Nagar police station.

Bajinder Kumar, the mastermind behind the operation visited Dubai in search of work but resorted to cheating Indians for a lump sum money for the past 6 years. The accused, along with Bajinder’s brother Sumit Kumar, Hisar resident Nikhil (31), Panipat residents Subhash, Gorinder Singh, Sahil and Pradeep Man and Harvinder Singh from Punjab were taken into judicial custody after their trial in the district court.

Circle officer of Indirapuram and in-charge of the cyber cell, Abhay Mishra, informed that the gang was operating through 3 websites (star345.com, bet33.com and wa.me.com) and lured their potential victims to download a betting app called “Rising Star” by sending them links through WhatsApp and Telegram.ple of extra income and sent them links on WhatsApp and Telegram. The link navigated them to star345.com and asked them to download ‘Rising Star’, a betting app. These scammers will get them to sign up into one of their websites for retrieving the money where they will monitor the user activities. The users will then start adding their money to the account and make bets which progressively increases until a large deposit, over 50,000, is made which is when the accused would deactivate their account and disappear into thin air.

“The gang also used to coax people to open current bank accounts with the help of documents of fictitious online companies. They used to deposit Rs 4 lakh once the account was opened, paying the facilitator Rs 5,000 per day. Transactions of around Rs 20 lakh to Rs 40 lakh — the money cheated from the players — took place from each such account,” Mishra said as reported by the Times Of India.