Varanasi: The Cyber Crime Cell and Pratibimb Cell of the Varanasi Commissionerate on Friday busted an interstate job fraud racket and arrested 19 accused, including alleged kingpin Deepak Kumar Shah. Police also rescued around 300 young men and women who were allegedly trapped in the network through false job promises.ACP Vidush Saxena said the accused were operating a fake firm, Mahadev Enterprises, and allegedly running an illegal multi-level marketing and pyramid scheme in the name of a franchise of Royal Health Wellness Private Limited.According to police, unemployed youths from Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh were contacted over phone and lured to Varanasi with promises of office jobs, employment in a Tata company, or agricultural work with a monthly salary of Rs 25,000.After arriving in the city, the candidates were made to attend interviews in a corporate-like setup and asked to pay Rs 30,000-35,000 as joining or registration fees.In return, they were allegedly given kits worth only Rs 1,000-2,000 containing items such as clothes, oil and soap.Police said the recruits were then put through “training” and pressured to enroll relatives, friends and acquaintances into the network. Each member was allegedly required to bring in three new recruits and threatened with loss of salary and forfeiture of deposited money if they failed to do so.During the investigation of Shah’s SBI and HDFC Bank accounts, police found five complaints on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCRP), while four victims submitted written complaints. Preliminary findings revealed that nearly Rs 4 crore had been credited to the accounts over the past year. A detailed examination of the financial transactions is underway.The arrested accused are residents of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Police recovered 20 smartphones, a laptop, two luxury vehicles, Rs 4,020 in cash and documents linked to Mahadev Enterprises. Investigators also found chats and audio recordings allegedly related to the fraud in the seized phones.A white Grand Vitara and a black Kia Carens were seized on suspicion that they were purchased using proceeds of the crime. Around Rs 1 lakh in a bank account has also been frozen.Police said the operation exposed the structure of a wider cyber fraud network. Under the ‘Cyber Vajra’ campaign, the Cyber Crime Police Station and Pratibimb Cell have so far registered eight cases and arrested 28 alleged cybercriminals.
