Bhubaneswar, April 15: Economic Offences Wing, Bhubaneswar has arrested two persons identified as Ved Prakash from Anupgarh, Rajsthan and Sudhir Patel from Sundargarh for allegedly duping crores of rupees from people the name of investment with different Crypto
.After arrest, the accused Ved Prakash was produced before the Hon’ble Court of ACJM, Anupgarh, Rajsthan, and was brought on transit remand to Bhubaneswar.
The case was registered on the allegation of Pram Sagar Khamari against the arrested persons and others for duping many investors like him mainly in Western Odisha of more than Rs.14 Cr. in the name of investment with different Crypto through the agencies like ENG Crypto, Entice Capital, USDT Club, ADS Exchange, CRIT 11 etc. The persons were inducing the investors for hefty returns on low investment. The informant being induced by the persons invested Rs.48, 02,200 and had received the meager return of Rs.20,000 only.
The arrested accused Ved Prakash having his qualification of +2 Arts (not completed) was formerly working as a Constable in Rajsthan Police and was removed after 05 years of service for his misconduct and dereliction of duty. He was defrauding the investors by mentioning him as the Country Head of the crypto investment whereas other accused Sudhir Patel was the State Head for Odisha. Both the accused were hiding since long after registration of the case. However a team of EOW was tracking them. Ved Prakash was arrested at Anupgarh with the help of Rajasthan Police.
The arrested persons in connivance with others during the year 2022 held extensive promotional activities in different parts of Odisha by organizing meetings for investment in crypto currency to get high returns and even double of the invested amount within a very short period. They were inducing the investors to arrange more and more new investors in the scheme so as to get the extra benefits.
In order to attract the investors, the persons prepared and used false documents like brochure and schemes, promising high rate of interest proportionately to the quantum of investment.
In order to win the confidence of the investors, initially for very few months, they paid very small amounts as returns, and after collection of crores of rupees, they stopped paying any return and remained absconded. In reality, the fraudsters were running illegal Ponzi scheme and the up-line members were being paid the promised returns from the amount collected from the downline members.
They were collecting deposits from the general public either through the bank account or by cash.
As found, they were targeting not so educated persons lacking computer knowledge. They were taking advantage of the computer illiteracy of the investors and asking them to transfer the money directly to the accounts managed/run by them.
As revealed during investigation so far, the persons/fraudsters have collected the money by giving the false impression to invest the same with crypto whereas not a single amount has been deposited towards crypto investment. They were simply defrauding the investors by taking the name of different crypto coins and agencies.
The fraudsters, as found have cheated around 500 investors mainly from the places like Puri, Bhubaneswar, Sambalpur, Jharsuguda, Sundargarh and Bargarh Districts of Odisha of more than Rs.15 Cr. The fraudsters in the similar fashion have also cheated the investors of Maharashtra also. However the amount cheated in Maharashtra is not known yet.
EOW Odisha would write/ alert the Maharashtra Police about this scam and scammers. Many incriminating documents have been seized from the arrested accused persons.
