Hyderabad: The Gachibowli police have busted a holiday membership racket in which 19 victims were cheated of about ₹22 lakh, and arrested 15 offenders on Saturday.On Friday, Gachibowli police received a complaint from one V Swaraj, alleging that representatives of The Pacific Holiday World induced him to buy their holiday membership through false promises at an event held at a star hotel in Gachibowli. Believing their assurances, Swaraj said he paid ₹3.4 lakh through his credit card on July 16. “After receiving the payment, the accused failed to provide the promised membership benefits and stopped responding to my calls and messages. I also learnt that several other persons were cheated by the same company in a similar manner,” the complainant told police.Acting swiftly on the complaint, Gachibowli police verified with the star hotel where the company was conducting promotional meetings with prospective customers.
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Police found out that the organisers were staying in four flats at an apartment in Kondapur, and raided the flats.Police arrested 15 organisers, including Md Aqif, Shivam Sharma, Shanu Kumar, Santosh Kumar, Piyush, Jay Singhal, Aparna Chouhan, Shubham Shukla, Mohit Chauhan, Himanshi Nigam, Anak Agarwal, Ayush Bajpai, Amit, Pranav Pandey and Prashant Kumar Karan, who are mainly from Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.“The Pacific Holiday World is a unit of 4R Seasons Holidays Private Limited in Kalkaji, New Delhi. Its directors are Rajesh Kumar, Md Reehan Akhtar, Abdul Rashid and Ram Singh Dhami. The company deployed marketing executives to shopping malls and commercial establishments in major cities. They distributed free gift coupons and collected mobile numbers from visitors. They later invited the victims to promotional meetings at star hotels and persuaded them to buy memberships priced at ₹1.25 lakh and higher for seven nights of annual accommodation at five-star destinations in India and abroad,” Gachibowli inspector K Saidulu said.The preliminary probe has revealed that so far, 19 victims from the city were collectively cheated for about ₹22 lakh. “We are trying to identify additional victims and arrest the main organisers,” the inspector said.
