Cons prey on people in distress as SOS calls flood social media
NEW DELHI: Rashmi Mehra, a public health professional, came across a phone number on a WhatsApp group on April 24. She received the number from another acquaintance who spotted the message on Twitter.
The tweet read: “Oxygen cylinders available for all. Contact number- (mentioned number) (Dheeraj) Location: Delhi (Rohini). ‘Available, Just Spoke on call’ (sic)”
Mehra passed on the number to her friend, whose father, along with other family members, are down with Covid-19.
“My friend needed an oxygen cylinder for her grandmother, whose oxygen levels were dropping. On her behalf, I found a lead. Even though he was charging a lot, we settled for him. My friend made an advance payment of Rs 10,000 as sought by the vendor. He was not reachable after she made the payment at noon. By evening, even our messages were not getting delivered,” said Mehra.
She said the family is still battling Covid. “My friend’s family members are battling for life right now. In such a situation, filing a complaint is the last thing on her mind,” said Mehra.
Mehra’s friend is among the scores of people who are getting scammed as they desperately seek help in the ongoing crisis. The second wave of Covid-19 across the country – and the fourth in Delhi— has spelt doom with a record number of people testing positive for the virus daily and at least 300 people dying of the infection in the Capital everyday over the past few days.
Amid this unprecedented surge in cases, social media platforms are flooded with desperate pleas for help to find vacant hospital beds, ventilators, oxygen cylinders, and medicines such as remdesivir. While there are many citizens who have stepped up to help, some fraudsters are exploiting the situation and cashing in on people’s misery in these trying times.
Mehra said her friend was a doctor but failed to secure a bed for her own family members. Driven by the helplessness of the situation, she was compelled to make the transaction.
“In a normal situation, one would think before making any payment. But the crisis is so bad that one is left with no choice but to take decisions fraught with great risk,” she said.
Harish Arunachalam, who works with a multinational technology company in Dublin, paid an advance of Rs 10,000 for an oxygen cylinder for a family member whose oxygen levels started dropping. Sitting miles away from home, Arunachalam made desperate calls to friends in Delhi who were able to find a lead on Twitter. Soon after the payment, the calls on the vendor’s number went unanswered and the promised oxygen cylinder never came.
“Since I am not in the country, my friends were coordinating on my behalf. They found a lead on Twitter and called the number. The vendor seemed genuine to us. He sought our Aadhaar number and other details. We made a calculated risk but the delivery never happened,” said Arunachalam. He said with so many “verified” leads floating on social media and other users vouching for the authenticity of such leads, people fall for such scams.
“The word verified has lost its meaning. When friends tell you that a lead is verified, it just becomes more believable. We didn’t realize that there are others trying to use the crisis to their advantage,” said Arunachalam. The cases are far too many. When 25-year-old Feroze’s father’s oxygen levels started dipping below 89 this week, the banking professional started hunting for an oxygen cylinder. A lead, originally shared on a social media platform, came his way. He called on the number and was asked to make an advance payment of Rs 5,000, which he promptly did.
“Since the situation was critical, I immediately made the payment only to realize that the vendor was a fraud. In these terrible times, along with the loss of life, we are also witnessing loss of money,” said Feroze.
Delhi Police officers said they will take action against fraudsters misusing pleas for help on social media. Chinmoy Biswal, spokesperson for Delhi Police, said, “If people who have been duped file complaints, we will conduct investigation and take strict action against the fraudsters if the allegations are found to be true. We are already keeping a vigil on hoarding and black marketing of life-saving medicines, injections and oxygen. More than 20 people have been arrested for such offences in the last one week or so.”
Deputy commissioner of police (cyber cell) Anyesh Roy said given the current situation, people are desperate and as a result, verification--that they would have done in normal circumstances--have taken a back seat. Roy said while there are some people who have not delivered since they had exhausted their capacity, there were instances of frauds too.
“If you are asked to pay in advance, you should meet the vendor once. Insist on getting the physical location. This is a basic precaution. People should go through proper channels, such as hospitals, instead of informal means,” said Roy. He said that now medicines were being available through formal channels, which means that anyone still claiming to sell these medicines was likely to be a fraud.