Two women among 4 more held for fake call centre racket, hunt on for other gang members

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:17.03.2020

In the continuing crackdown on a gang involved in duping loan aspirants of crores of rupees through fake call centres, the central crime branch of the city police on Monday arrested four people, including two women. A court later sent P Satishkumar, 30, of Walajapet, P Prasanna, 29, of Kolathur, E Preethi, 32, of Virugambakkam and R Kalpana, 28, to jail. The last named was arrested for a house break-in last year and was later released on bail.

Sleuths of the CCB’s Bank Fraud Prevention Wing had on March 12 arrested seven suspects and nabbed three others on March 7 as part of the same probe. Those arrested on Monday, investigators said, were working under prime suspect Munir Hussain, helping him set up three fake call centres. A hunt is on for Muni Hussain who police say has been involved in the racket for the past three years..

Those arrested earlier were working under other kingpins spread across the city and its suburbs, police said, adding that they expected to arrest others in the coming days.

The modus operandi of the gang, which investigators believe could have more than 100 members, involved tele-callers, mostly women, contacting members of the public over phone and convincing them to invest in insurance schemes to secure high value loans at low interest.

All they needed to do was to transfer the amount for the first annual premium and a commission to a bank account, the women at the other end of the line would tell the unsuspecting victims. She would also give out her personal phone number that the victims could call anytime. Once the money flowed into the given account, it would be moved to another account and the call centre staff would disappear after chucking the phone number given.

While Satishkumar and Prasanna were part of the back office staff monitoring the collection of money, Preethi controlled the team leaders at Thousand Lights centre and Kalpana had been running a ‘call centre’ in Sithalapakkam.

The probe in to the fake call centre gang is being supervised by Additional Commissioner of Police (CCB) C Easwaramurthy. Police have requested the public to be wary of callers who come up with attactive online loan offers.

The CCB sleuths last week arrested at least ten people including ‘Benze Club’ Saravanan, after busting several fake call centres across the city.