Four held for duping people via websites

Four men from Mumbai have been arrested by Pune police for duping more than 24000 people through fraud websites in the name of multi level marketing.

The arrested are identified as Rupesh Katkar, Sandip Lokhande, Parashu Tambe, Bhaven Joshi, all from Mumbai.

According to police, they came across this online fraud while investigating a complaint lodged by a Nigdi-based youth. The youth came to know through his friend that if he invests an amount on two websites www.makeinindia.rocks and www.rocksfamilyglobal.com he will get 150% returns in a year. He invested Rs 6.71 lakh from January 2016 till January 2017. But later both the website got closed down.

Sudhir Hiremath, DCP, Cyber Cell, Pune Police, said, “When we started to investigate the matter we realised that the four accused have been cheating people through their websites. The accused developed two website and a software to run multi level marketing website. They approached people to invest in websites by taking various workshops.”

He added, “We have received Rs 36.25 lakh cash from the accused. We have also blocked various banks accounts of the accused that have deposits of more than Rs 10 lakh. The data on their computer and software systems say that they have 24,000 clients who have invested money through their websites. We have been investing the matter and trying to find out whether it is spread across the nation.”

All four are booked under relevant sections of The Prize Chits and Money Circulation Schemes (Banning) Act, 1978. Four accused were produced in the court and are given police custody for 12 days.