City Limouzine Investment finance fraud

Cops bust gang that lured bizman into honeytrap, duped him of ₹25L


The Gamdevi police have busted a ‘friendship club’ racket and arrested four members of the gang that would lure victims into a honeytrap and stage police raids wherein fake cops would demand money to hush up the matter.


The arrested accused —Andheri resident Daliya Sumasti (51), gang leader Ayub Rahman Khan, and Ganesh Solanki and Raghvendra Aotgire, who posed as policemen—have been booked for cheating, impersonation and criminal conspiracy. The police are on the lookout for their six accomplices, including three women.

The arrests were made based on a complaint by a businessman from Bhulabhai Desai Road who was cheated of Rs 25 lakh by the ‘friendship club’ members.

The complainant said that in April, a woman, who identified herself as Gimmy, called on his phone and offered membership in her ‘friendship club’. “They would chat every day,” said a police officer. “In May, Gimmy asked him to meet her outside Andheri station. She then took him to a flat in Amboli, where she introduced him to two other women saying they were her friends. She then offered him a drink.” The complainant told the police that half an hour later, two men rang the doorbell. “They said they were policemen and had received a complaint about a prostitution racket being run at the flat. “They demanded Rs 10 lakh from the complainant to not book him in a prostitution case. The victim bargained and said he would give Rs 5 lakh. They agreed,” said the police officer. The complainant said that he took ‘policemen’ Solanki and Aotgire to his bank in Babulnath, withdrew Rs 5 lakh and gave it to them.


In June, the victim got a call from another woman, who identified herself as Anita Mistry and said she wanted to be his friend. On his birthday, Anita asked him to meet her in Dahisar and sent her address on WhatsApp. “The complainant said there were two other women in the flat, who Anita introduced as her paying guests. While the two women sat in the living room, Anita asked him to follow her to the bedroom and offered him a drink,” said the police officer. After 15 minutes, Solanki and Aotgire raided the flat and ‘busted’ a prostitution racket. This time, they sought Rs 15 lakh, but the victim bargained and brought it down to Rs 5 lakh. Again, he took them to his bank, withdrew cash and gave it to them.

A week later, an unidentified man reached the businessman’s residence and demanded he pay Rs 15 lakh else the two ‘cops’ would arrest him in the prostitution racket. The complainant panicked and paid up. After a few days, he realized that he had been duped and approached the Gamdevi police. Following a probe, the police tracked down Khan in Bhayander two weeks ago. His interrogation led them to Solanki and Aotgire. The police suspect the gang might have duped several men using this modus operandi.

An increasing number of men across India are falling victim to online honeytraps who lure them into performing sexual acts in front of a webcam and then threaten to post the video online unless they get money, reports Mohua Das.

“Indian men tend to indulge in sexual fantasies online more freely than women do. But when eventually trapped, they fear for their reputation and avoid the police,” says Balsing Rajput, superintendent of police (cyber), Maharashtra, who is studying cyber-economic crimes.


Beware those online sirens
Sex and blackmail are taking on a vicious new life on the internet




On a late February evening after work, Rahul Mehta (name changed), a 27-year-old bachelor in Delhi, was settling into his favourite bedtime routine — swiping left and right on a dating app, looking for a potential mate. Suddenly, a message popped up: ‘Hi, I’m Areej. Let’s chat’. “I had a match and she was beautiful. Darkhaired, fair-skinned, light-eyed…and from Morocco,” recalls Rahul.

Excited at the possibility of moving his digital dating life into the real world, he went from matching on Tinder to chatting on WhatsApp to video-calling each other on Facebook within a few days.


“Take off your T-shirt,” she wrote to Rahul one evening. Aroused by the mysterious woman, he did as told. The next thing he knew, Rahul had stripped and was climaxing in front of the camera. In a few minutes, another message popped up, this time with an online link to a video recording of his act and a terrifying voice message. “You have been fooled. I’m a man, not a woman, and if you do not send me $2000, I will share the video with your friends and family,” it said.

Crippled by fear and shame, the software engineer pleaded with his blackmailer. “I told him I had no money and managed to bring the figure down to $20. After he received the money transfer, I blocked him on my phone.” A second ransom demand for $100 followed but this time, Rahul turned to law enforcement agencies. “I haven’t heard from him ever since.”

People have always been fools for love and lust. But the sweeping reach and possibilities of the internet have intensified risks and made those seeking companionship vulnerable to a 21st-century crime called ‘sextortion’ or sexual extortion.

Mentally and financially damaging, this form of cyber-blackmail is becoming more common in India. In Pune recently, a 28-year-old newly married man in Pune opened an email from an unknown sender one morning to find sexually explicit photos and videos of himself from a past online encounter. The mail demanded a ransom of a lakh to avoid disclosure. “Scared of how it might destroy his marriage, he came to me and the police. We managed to track the IP address. It turned out to be a man and he was arrested,” says Ritesh Bhatia, a Mumbaibased cybercrime investigator who has witnessed a spike in sextortion cases in the past one year.

Out of 15 victims he dealt with, ten were men. Earlier this year, a 65-yearold man from Nashik got ripped off by Rs 8.32 lakh by his sexting partner. Intervention by cops helped seize the scammer’s account.

A pan-India survey by Microsoft last year revealed how widespread the problem is. Of the teens (aged 13-17) and adults (18-74) who were asked about their encounters with 17 different online risks across four categories — behavioural, reputational, sexual, and intrusive — 77% Indians reported their concerns on unwanted sexual solicitation, sexting, revenge porn, or sextortion.

Curiously, the report revealed that more males in India had reported risks across the categories at 64%. This may be because more women (61%) had tightened their privacy controls compared to males (50%) after experiencing online risk. “Males in India are more confident about managing incivility, and, therefore experience more personal risks,” stated the report.

Formal arrests in sextortion cases are still a rarity. The nature of the offence compels most victims to stay anonymous, out of fear, shame and self-blame. “The anonymity that the Internet offers can cloud judgment and Indian men tend to indulge in sexual fantasies online more freely than women. When trapped in a cyber scam, they fear for their reputation and avoid the police,” says Balsing Rajput, SP cyber, Maharashtra. “The victim should understand that even though they consented to getting clicked or sent pictures, they still have a right to justice,” he says.

The predators hiding behind the photograph or fake webcam video of an attractive woman are almost always men too. The scammer could be an old flame, a neighbour or a honey trap most likely in the Philippines or Nigeria. “Although the easiest way to trace them is through the servers, most scammers use virtual private networks and ask for money in bitcoin and overseas accounts that makes it challenging for us,” says Rajput.

Extortion by means of sexual harassment was the second most popular method after phishing, reveals Rajput, a PhD scholar at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, who is studying cyber economic crimes in India between 2002 and 2016.

“Cyber economic crime is borderless and no single agency controls the Internet. Law enforcement agencies face a major problem in collecting information from foreign countries,” he says.

But the upside is that matters of cybercrime and justice are being taken seriously by law enforcers and social media. “Victims and service-providers need to come forward to help us trace and bust such syndicates,” he adds.




FLIRTING WITH DANGER: Screenshots of the threat and the money transfer made by Rahul Mehta after he received a ransom demand of 

Given the changing nature of crime — the focus is now shifting to cybersecurity threats — the government has deemed fit to recruit computer geeks. The need of the hour is to neutralise dangers posed by malware created by nerds sitting in some remote place with the sole objective of destabilising a country. Keeping that in mind, the government will set up state-of-the-art cyber police units at districts and sub-divisional levels, which need to be populated by those who have a thorough understanding of both hardware and software. It’s a classic case of brains replacing brawn as law-enforcers are generally recruited on the basis of their height, physical fitness and stamina. This is an altogether different ball game, where razor-sharp minds will engage in bloodless battles.

The decision to hire geeks is also in sync with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision, which seeks participation from the country’s youth to help India fight these dangers. Cybercrime is a world in itself — the virtual world leaving a trail of destruction in the real world. It ranges from bullying, email spam, phishing and online scams to identity theft, posting illegal and offensive content on the web and accessing or uploading child pornography. However, it is the attacks on computer systems that have made countries realise their vulnerabilities. There had been at least 37 major ransomware attacks on India in 2017 alone, out of which WannaCry and Petya were the deadliest.

Though India’s cybersecurity laws are evolving to take stock of such threats, they need to be made more comprehensive. There is also a crying need to develop a digital architecture that can withstand the vicious assaults. India has no shortage of talent. The government only needs to provide the right tools to these computer professionals. India should lead the global war against cybercrime.

A controversy has erupted over the proposal to increase the height of the mechanised parking building at Ashok Marg in C-Scheme. BJP councillor Anil Sharma has come out against his party and has written a letter to the Mayor and Jaipur Municipal Corporation commissioner (JMC) Ravi Jain in which he has not only opposed the move but also alleged Rs 100 crore scam.

During the previous Ashok Gehlot government, the construction of a mechanised parking on PPP mode was proposed and developer was allowed to build a 12-metre high building on the nullah for 400 vehicles’ parking and the developer was allowed to run commercial activities in the building.

According to sources, the developer had appealed to the Local Self Government (LSG) Department to increase the height of the parking building 12 to 22 metres a few days ago. The LSG department has instructed the JMC to take action in this regard. After getting information about this, BJP councillor Anil Sharma has written a letter to Mayor Ashok Lahoti and JMC Commissioner Ravi Jain opposing the increase of the height. Sharma has warned the municipal authorities that legal action will be taken against them if permission is given to increase the height of the building illegally.

“It is illegal to increase the height of the parking building. Under the contract, the height of the building cannot be increased,” said Sharma. He has alleged corruption in the parking project and said the developer is not following the contract terms. Mechanised parking must be men free as per rules. But the developer is deploying staff for 10 to 12 vehicles. The developer has not yet approved the inside layout plan of the building from the municipal corporation.

No Approval Yet
The developer is deploying staff for 10 to 12 vehicles and has yet not approved the inside layout plan of the building from the municipal corporation. Under the project, a three-storey commercial complex on Zero Setback is being built on 40 feet road, which is illegal.

Scammers are on the prowl in the housing space.

Housing finance regulator National Housing Bank (NHB) has alerted housing finance companies (HFCs) about over 80 specific fraudulent transactions in Maharashtra, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, among others, and asked the firms to indicate whether any housing loan has been granted to these entities. It has directed the HFCs to make in-depth inquiries before granting or renewing any facility to these fraudsters. In many cases, gaps in the anti-fraud systems and processes of the lenders have been exploited by the tricksters.

A large number of cases happened in and around Mumbai such as Vasai-Virar, Palghar, Panvel, and Pune. Fraudulent registration of already mortgaged property and misrepresentation by seller and borrower are also quite common.

In Jharkhand, a fake seller and fake borrower created the deed in the name of original seller and borrower. KYCs and income documents of the original borrower were produced for the loan. NHB said that verifications of the property papers and documents were not done properly.

A property in Delhi's Janak Puri was mortgaged with many lenders, but the legal search report did not identify that the property was mortgaged with multiple institutions. In Mumbai, swindlers posed as borrowers and appeared to be taking different premises on rent for applying for loans from different financiers.

In some cases, the con artists committed identity theft and then availed loans. In Mumbai's Vikhroli, the fraudster availed a loan of Rs 41 lakh by impersonation. The documents viz. KYC and income papers were stolen and used for availing the loan. The impersonator also availed loan from multiple institutions, according to officials who have read the NHB circular.

Stating that these fraudulent transactions have been brought to the NHB's notice by different constituents, the regulator has told the HFCs to ask branches and offices to remain alert. In almost all cases, the NHB has provided the name of the person/entity in whose account the fraud occurred, the modus operandi, serious irregularities observed and the causative factors. However, the name of the lending institution(s) which witnessed the fraud act was not disclosed.

With HFCs interested in giving loans in sync with the government's housing for all mission, many fraudsters have tried to game the system.

Deo Shankar Tripathi, MD and CEO, Aadhar Housing Finance, said, "The most common fraud is multiple financing on the same property by fabricating the tiitle deeds and various know your customer (KYC) documents of customers and sellers. Profile funding taken by builders by organising a set of customers and availing loan in their name. Frauds are also committed by submission of fabricated financial documents as well as fake employee certificates in cash salary cases."

Weighed under heavy debt burden, sometimes customers willingly participated in frauds. In Rajasthan, a property was sold through duplicate/fake title deeds even though the legal title is with the lending institution. In this case, the customer was stuck in debt trap and acted fraudulently with financers.

Fraudsters are also using new methods, as the fraud monitoring and catching methods have gaping holes.

In Bangalore, it was found that there is a group of people who are involved in fraudulent sales and have defrauded a number of financial institutions. The group first identifies unclaimed properties in the city. Thereafter, they study every detail of the property including possible weakness in the property chain. To establish a connection with an old transaction in the property, they create fake documents and hire individuals who impersonated the identity of true owners of the property to get these documents registered with sub-registrar. Once a connection is established, they enter into a sale transaction within the group to avail home loans. Further, to establish credibility and to gain easy approvals from financial institutions, these individuals create a good credit history by creating repayment track records, income papers, business establishments, bank accounts etc.

In some cases, fraudsters -- the customer and his team -- book flats with a nominal advance and apply loans from different financial companies. Based on the loan sanction condition, they make forged documents and submit the same with financial institutions and receive the sanctioned amounts in their account opened in the name of the builder.

In Delhi and Rohtak, the NHB came across cases where the field investigation (FI) agency and valuer did not show due diligence while performing their job. The FI reports and valuation reports were managed by the direct selling agent or the DSA.

MODUS OPERANDI
Fraudulent registration of already mortgaged property and misrepresentation by seller and borrower are also quite common 
Frauds are committed by submission of fabricated financial documents as well as fake employee certificates in cash salary cases

Making friends with a stranger on Facebook turned out to be costly for a Malad-based woman. The woman was befriended by a cyber crook, who induced her to pay Rs 11.19 lakh in different bank accounts and in return promised to give her 30,000 Euros as a gift.

"While surfing Facebook on June 6, the woman came across the profile of a stranger who had sent her a request. An unsuspecting Yadav accepted the request and then, the con game began which left her poorer by Rs 11 lakh," said an officer from Kurar police station.

"Gradually the said person started gaining the woman's trust and told her that he is sending her a gift of 30,000 Euros. Then on various pretexts to get the said gift released from the airport, the fraudster and his associates induced Yadav to pay money in various bank accounts. When the accused kept demanding more money, the woman got suspicious and soon learnt that she had fallen prey to cyber-fraud," the officer said.

The woman lodged a complaint with Kurar police under section 419 (cheating by personation) and 420 (cheating) of IPC and section 66D (whoever by means of any communication device cheats by impersonation) of IT Act.

THE CON GAME
The woman was befriended by a cyber crook, who induced her to pay Rs 11.19 lakh in different bank accounts and in return promised to give her 30,000 Euros as a gift

 This one has some similarities to the Nirav Modi case. A senior employee of a diamond trading firm who aided his employer in fabricating property documents to secure an overdraft facility of Rs 1 crore and duped Punjab National Bank has been arrested by Mumbai police.

The banking unit of the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) on Wednesday arrested Yogesh Pujwani (59), a diamond assorter responsible for evaluating the quality of precious stones; they are now looking for his employer Amit Bipin Shah.

The complainant in the case is Divakar Prasad, a senior official from the asset recovery branch of the bank at Dalamal House at Nariman point. Prasad in his complaint has alleged that ASR Diamonds’ proprietor Shah had in 2008 applied for an overdraft facility by way of a mortgage with PNB’s Opera House branch.

Shah had submitted documents to an upmarket flat at Geeta Smruti housing society at Gamdevi. “Shah submitted the share certificate, registration agreement, and NOC from the soceity. The bank sent those documents for legal scrutiny and it gave a clearance,” said an officer.

Shah availed of the overdraft facility until 2009 when he began to default on his repayments. Shah's loan turned a non performing asset for the bank. In 2010 the bank wrote to Shah and when he failed to respond, it issued a notice warning it would attach his flat.

However, when PNB officials visited the flat, they found a family had been living there for two decades and they had never sold their flat to Amit Shah. The flat owner informed the PNB official that Shah had similarly duped ICICI Bank, Bajaj Finance and Citi Finance using the same documents; officials from these banks too had turned up to take the possession of the flat.

PNB officials then lodged a complaint with the DB Marg police. The case was transferred to EOW.

Bizman accused of ₹4,500cr investor fraud held

City businessman Omprakash Goenka who has been accused of defrauding around 18 lakh investors across the state of about Rs 4,500 crore has been arrested by Nashik cops from his Wadala office in one of the cheating cases. Goenka’s Royal Twinkle Star Club (RTSC) had allegedly lured investors with high returns. These investors were promised a total returns of around Rs 7,500 crore.

In August 2015, the securities and exchange board of India (Sebi) had imposed a fouryear ban on the firm and its four directors for illegally raising over Rs 2,656 crore in the garb of ‘time share’ holiday plans. The capital market regulator, which had been keeping a close watch on illicit money-pooling schemes, had directed the company to refund the money along with promised returns to the investors.

The Nashik (Rural) economic offences wing (EOW) police personnel picked up Goenka from his office on May 21 after a group of investors from Lasalgaon, near Malegaon, lodged a complaint saying they were cheated of Rs 1.8 crore by RTSC. While Goenka is the MD of RSTC, police are yet to arrest three directors. Goenka has been sent to police custody till May 31.

One of the victims, Kavita Pagar (38), a homemaker, said she had invested Rs 15 lakh she had saved over the years. “We have got around 1,200 to 1,300 investors so far. The have approached us,” said an officer from the Nashik EOW. The Mumbai EOW is also probing a separate case against RTSC office bearers for cheating thousands of investors. The Mumbai EOW has so far received over 500 complaint letters.

“The complaint was first registered at Mumbai’s Rafi Ahmed Kidwai Marg police station and later transferred to the EOW. The investors include farmers, labourers, teachers, government employees, businessmen and agents. The schemes—Crystal, Saffron, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Royal and Orange —continued from 2008 to 2016,” said a police officer.

RTSC ran such schemes across the country, said a police officer. In the Mumbai case, the complainant, who works as a manager at a liquor shop, was also an agent for the firm and had invested not only his own money, but also of his relatives and clients, said police.

“The accused had also promised hotel stay packages, based on the reward points, to the investors. We have booked the accused under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and stringent law Maharashtra Protection of Interest of Depositors’ Act,” added an officer.

The EOW had early this year carried out searches at six places in Mumbai.

Two Indian men and a woman have been sentenced to 517 years each in jail by a Dubai court for swindling thousands of people in a multi-million-dollar fraud case, the UAE media reported.

Sydney Lemos, from Mapusa in north Goa, was the chief executive of Exential, a forex trading company in Dubai Media City. Investors lost over USD 200 million when Exential failed to pay out after promising 120 per cent returns on a USD 25,000 (Dirham 91,800) investment.

The accused - Lemos, his wife Valany and Ryan D'Souza - were convicted on Sunday by the Dubai Misdemeanours Court in the 515 cases filed against them and were sentenced to one year in jail each in 513 cases and two years in jail for the remaining two cases, Gulf News reported.

Dr Mohammad Hanafi, the presiding judge of the special bench, sentenced Valany in absentia. She remains at large.

Lemos, said to be in his late 30s, was arrested in January last year while de Souza was arrested while he was trying to leave the UAE.

The Exential Group took money from investors promising huge returns by investing the money in the foreign exchange market. In the beginning, investors were paid, but gradually the payments stopped, the report said.

Investigations have revealed that Exential owner Lemos, a flamboyant man, who also sponsors a football club in Goa, transferred the money to Australia-based brokerage firm FC Prime owned by his wife Valany.

Prosecutors had accused the defendants of swindling and deception and referred the case to the special panel on October 31.

The first hearing took place on December 25 last year and the trial concluded with the sentencing on Sunday. Sunday's court ruling remains subject to appeal, the report said.

Exential's office was shut down by the Department of Economic Development of Dubai in July 2016. Earlier reports said around 7,000 UAE residents lost their life's savings in the massive scam.

A UAE lawyer representing a group of victims said the ruling may help recover some of his clients' money.

Atty Barney Almazar, director of Gulf Law, is working with the Philippine Embassy to assist victims. He is the advocate of a number of Filipinos who invested in Exential.

"The court decision of more than 500 years' imprisonment sends a very strong message to the public that Dubai is not taking financial crimes lightly," Almazar told Gulf News.

"This judgement can be used to support the victims' civil claims and efforts in locating the assets of the company. The decision will be acceptable in foreign jurisdictions. In any criminal act, the fruits of the crime will be forfeited. Of course, there is a process and this is not a guarantee," Almazar said. 

In a huge scandal that has emerged from Bengaluru, it now appears that at least 800 people were duped by a ponzi-scheme that was being run by city-based Vikram Investments. While the scam came to light after a local businessman complained, many prominent film and sportspersons have also been duped by the scheme.

These include bigwigs like Rahul Dravid, Saina Nehwal and Prakash Padukone, Banashankari inspector Puttuswamy confirmed to TNM.

“They had made some investments saying that they will guarantee profits in commodity trading but they haven't given profits so we have filed a case under Section 420,” Puttuswamy told TNM.

TNM reached out to Prakash Padukone’s secretary, who denied knowledge of the development. We also tried to get in touch with Rahul Dravid, but did not receive a response.

The complaint and crores worth of loot

The news of the scam broke on Monday, when Bengaluru police arrested five people - the firm owner and his associates - who have reportedly cheated at least 60 people. Ragavendra Srinath, who ran Vikam Investments, and his associates Narasimha Murthy, Prahalada, K C Nagaraj and Sutram Suresh, were arrested last week and will be in police custody till March 17.

The scandal came to light after a businessman, PR Balaji, who owns the Balaji Agarbathi Company, complained about being cheated out of a fortune of Rs 12 crore.

So far, there are 66 complainants who have reportedly been duped of amounts ranging from Rs 5 lakh to several crores each. Police sources told TNM that while there hadn’t been able to zero in on an exact amount so far, it may be well over Rs 300 crore.

The modus operandi

Ragavendra Srinath was the MD of Vikram Investments, and according to police sources, he handpicked the others and made them wealth managers in the company. What was common among Narasimha Murthy, Prahlad, Sutram Suresh and KC Nagaraj was that they were all former LIC agents.

"Raghavendra Srinath banked on the influential contacts these men had made during their time as LIC agents. All four accomplices, through their careers as LIC agents and some of them journalists, had extremely good contacts with rich people," a senior police official told TNM.

Ragavendra’s wife, Sunitha, was the director of the company. She is currently absconding.

Police sources say that every potential investor was made to sign a written agreement in this regard.

"This gave them legitimacy in the eyes of the investors. They promised their clients to invest in foreign commodities but essentially, they were investing in the share market. However, their clients did not suspect foul play because they had signed an agreement stating that they would receive 15% interest on investment," the police source added.

Police say that the accused have been duping people for eight years now.

"Upon investigation, it was revealed that most of the investors had invested their black money. This worked out to the company's benefit because even the investors did not want to fall under the police net for possession of black money. We are probing to determine where the investors got the money from," the senior police official added.

"These men did not target only rich people. There are several investors who have put in their hard-earned money. They were all lured through the brochures of the company which showed celebrities as major investors. The celebrities in question had no knowledge about the company using their names," the official said.

How a former sports journalist roped in investors

According to police sources, it was Sutram Suresh, a former sports journalist who roped in sportspersons and got them to invest in the scheme.

"Sutram Suresh had connections to prominent sports persons. He is suspected to be the man who got these sports personalities to invest in the scheme. As of now we are probing the matter and gathering evidence regarding him duping these personalities," a senior police officer told TNM.

Sutram was apparently unhappy with how much he was earning in his journalism job, one of his former colleagues, and an editor in a leading Bengaluru daily said. “I had worked with him for three years. He was good at his job. But one day in 2005 or 2006 he quit saying that he could make the money he was making in journalism in one day. Later we came to know he was a very successful LIC agent. But this is news to me that he was involved in this scheme,” Sutram’s former colleague said.

Sutram’s profile on his own website says that he had achieved “Top Of the Table status, which is the World’s highest recognition for a Financial Professional in the Million Dollar Round Table (MDRT)”. It also describes MDRT as an “international, independent association of more than 43,000 members, of the world's life insurance and financial services professionals from 470 companies in more than 71 countries.”
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What's the story?
In what has turned out to be a shocking series of events, Vikram Investment Company has recently hogged the headlines for duping over 800 investors through many of its schemes, a list which also includes the likes of prominent Indian sports stars Rahul Dravid, Prakash Padukone and Saina Nehwal.

The incident has surfaced after a recent inquiry was undertaken to assess the company's frauds which proved to be moving in the wrong direction, as complained by some of the investors of the firm.


In case you didn't know
Vikram Investment Company was started as the brainchild of owner Raghavendra Sreenath, who decided to start the firm right after he completed his Engineering degree.

The heart of the matter
It has been learnt that Raghavendra, in an approach to make his company bigger, set up the main office in Yeshwantpur and a branch in Banashankari following which he appointed three persons K.C Nagaraj, famed sports journalist Sutram Suresh and Narasimha Murthy as the financial managers, promising them hefty paychecks if they could lure investors into their company.

On receiving complaints from investors in the company, the police decided to take matters into their own hands and after some intense research into the matter arrested Raghavendra along with his four other associates.

According to the Bengaluru City Police, Sutram Suresh had a huge role to play in the whole scheme and was one of the key influencers in the group, mainly responsible for a cogent case of cajoling the sports stars to invest in the company.

What's next?
The police department will undoubtedly put more work into this case and hope to come out with a firm solution soon to put the investors' laments to rest.

Author's take
One should be very careful before investing and do a proper background check on the agents and on the companies. The risk involved in any such investment is huge and it is extremely unfortunate that prominent personalities have been caught in this particular scam.
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Rahul Dravid, former Indian cricket team captain, alongside badminton icons Saina Nehwal and Prakash Padukone are among the high-profile individuals who have been allegedly tricked by a Bengaluru-based Ponzi scheme, according to News18.

The high profile athletes are among 800 others, including well-known figures from the field of art, cinema, politics and commerce; all of whom seem to have been deceived by a firm called Vikram Investment Company according to the Bengaluru City Police.

The police have arrested Raghavendra Sreenath, the owner of the company along with agents Sutram Suresh, Narasimhamurthy, K C Nagaraj and Prahlad.

Suresh is said to be a well-known sports journalist in the Bengaluru circuits and was the person who convinced the sports personalities to invest in the ponzi scheme.

“They have been sent to police custody for 14 days. The gang has duped the investors of over Rs 300 crores. We are verifying the documents,” a police officer was quoted as saying by News 18.

The police claims that the accused has divulged information on all the investors and officers are scouring through their bank details.

The company had promised up to 40% returns on investments the police further claimed.

According to an Asianet report, the case came to the front after PR Balaji, owner of the Balaji Agarbathi Company, filed a complaint against Vikram Investment and its management.