Mumbai: A 64-year-old retired government bank official from Bandra West lost ₹17.80 lakh to a notorious ‘sextortion’ scam.
The man, who retired in 2019, received a series of WhatsApp messages recently from a woman who identified herself to be a resident of Gujarat. After exchanging pleasantries, the conversation quickly took an intimate turn.
A few messages later, the man received a video call, wherein the woman was naked and recorded the video with the man in the frame. After disconnecting the call, she made a voice call and threatened him to upload his video and register a police case against him, if he would not pay her ₹10,000.
The victim, however, did not pay the amount. On September 22, he got a voice call from a person who introduced himself as Vikram Rathod, claiming to be an officer from the Delhi police cyber cell. Rathod told the victim that a woman had registered a case against him with Delhi cyber police and a police team would soon leave to arrest him from Mumbai. The caller told him to deposit the amount in his bank account if he did not want to be arrested.
The victim then deposited a total ₹16.50 lakh into the bank account of the caller in several transactions, said a police officer.
Rathod again called the victim and said a woman had uploaded his nude video on YouTube, and he will soon get a call from Ranveer Gupta, who will remove his video. After two days, the victim received a call from Ranvir Gupta from a YouTube channel and he demanded ₹1.30 lakh for removing the video. “I got scared, and that day the bank was closed so I approached my friend in Bandra and deposited money through online money transfer in Kotak Mahendra bank,” said the victim in his statement to police.
Later, the victim got a call from Rathod, claiming that the woman who made the video call had died by suicide, and her father has been demanding money so Rathod asked to deposit more money. The victim then approached the Bandra police and registered a case against an unknown person.
“A case has been registered under section 170 (Personating a public servant), 385 (Whoever, in order to the committing of extortion, puts any person in fear, or attempts to put any person in fear, of any injury) and 387 (Putting or attempting to put a person in fear of death or grievous hurt in order to commit extortion) of the Indian Penal Code including IT act. Further investigation is going on” said senior inspector Rajesh Devere of the Bandra police station.