Mumbai: A sub-inspector attached to Goregaon police station was duped after Rs 78,765 was siphoned from his nationalised bank savings account through two fraudulent transactions on Aug 13. The sub-inspector learnt about the fraud when he visited a petrol pump on Independence Day to refuel his vehicle and noticed the bank account showed a low balance.Kherwadi police registered an FIR on Saturday based on a written complaint he filed earlier, and a request was made through the 1930 helpline to block the two transactions after the scammer managed to power off his mobile, police said.The sub-inspector, SV Virnodkar (58), was nearing retirement in the next few months and was stationed at Bombay High Court to handle cases. “The fraud occurred after Virnodkar clicked on some suspicious link. His mobile got conked and shut down and the screen showed ‘Emergency Calling’. We have sought details from the bank about the accounts to which the money is credited. Meanwhile, the bank’s nodal officer has been asked to freeze the two transactions,” said a police officer of Kherwadi police station.TOI said it was in possession of the FIR that Virnodkar filed against an unknown person. Virnodkar refused to talk and asked to meet personally. A Kherwadi police officer said Virnodkar had lost the money that he had earned through salary.In the complaint, Virnodkar said, “I was at my residence when my mobile phone was hacked and suddenly shut down, and the screen started showing ‘Emergency Calling’. After that, I restarted my mobile by entering my email ID, but the applications I used were not there, and all the old data from my mobile was erased.”On Aug 14, Virnodkar installed and started the Google Pay application on his mobile. “The next day when Virnodkar opened the Google Pay application to pay at a petrol pump, he noticed that the money in the account was less. When he checked the bank account he noticed two fraudulent transactions for Rs 48,765 and Rs 30,000 were done. He called the helpline number 1930 of the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal and registered a complaint under complaint number before filing the complaint with Kherwadi police,” said a police officer.
