Retired IIT Medical Officer Loses Rs 4.62 Crore To 'Digital Arrest Scam'

Two persons were arrested after a 74-year-old woman, who retired as medical officer of Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, was cheated of Rs 4.62 crore through threats of CBI action in a non-existent money laundering case, a police official said on Thursday.

He said Narendra Sinha and Gunjan Devkumar Dineshchandra were arrested by Western Region Cyber Cell of Mumbai police for providing bank accounts to cyber criminals to park the amount that was taken from the victim.

"The victim received a video call from a person posing as a telecom department official and then another accused posing as an IPS officer who claimed her Aadhaar card had been misused to open a bank account through which transactions worth Rs 6 crore had taken place, amounting to money laundering," the official said.

She was told that the Central Bureau of Investigation had registered a case in this regard and she was likely to be arrested.

"Under pressure, the woman prematurely withdrew her fixed and recurring deposits and transferred Rs 4.62 crore between October 2025 and January 2026 into bank accounts provided by the cyber criminals. After realising she had been cheated, the woman approached police and lodged a complaint," the official added.

A case of cheating by impersonation and offences under Information Technology Act was registered and later transferred to Western Region Cyber Cell for further investigation, he said.

A probe into the money trail zeroed in on Sinha and Dineshchandra, who had opened multiple bank accounts and provided them to cyber fraudsters, the official said.

"The amount that was deposited into these accounts was withdrawn by Sinha and Dineshchandra and handed over to cyber criminals in exchange for a commission. Based on these findings, the cyber cell arrested both the accused. Further investigation is underway to identify more persons involved in this case," the official said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)