Meanwhile, the ED and the UP STF carried out joint simultaneous raids at five places in Kanpur, Ghaziabad, and Noida, belonging to the accused, on Sunday
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Sunday registered a case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in the Rs 3,700-crore online fraud, in which nearly 7 lakh people were duped. The agency has registered a case on the basis of an FIR registered by the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STP) in Noida.
Meanwhile, the ED and the UP STF carried out joint simultaneous raids at five places in Kanpur, Ghaziabad, and Noida, belonging to the accused, on Sunday. The ED sleuths have also decided to seek police custody of the accused for interrogation.
Apart from the ED, the Hyderabad Police Cyber Unit has also started its probe and has reached Noida to question the prime accused, Abhinav Mittal. The Hyderabad Police have also received a complaint against him.
The Noida-based Ablaze Info Solutions Private Limited, belonging to Mittal, had been operating an online portal, socialtrade.biz, which was later renamed to frenzzup.com. Company Director Mittal, CEO Sridhar and Technical Head Mahesh Dayal were arrested after an FIR was lodged at the Soorajpur police station in Noida.
“Initial investigation has revealed that Mittal ran many offices in Kanpur, Ghaziabad, and Noida. We raided those offices and searches resulted in recovery of incriminating documents, revealing money laundering. The documents will be useful in the recovery of cheated funds as well as locating properties acquired using proceeds of crime beyond the frozen amount of Rs 500 crore balance in the accounts of the company,” Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), STF, Amit Pathak said.
Pathak further said the accused, through their web portal, promoted a scheme whereby liking the webpage that was fictitiously shown associated to the International social media groups, such as Google and Facebook, will bring money to users. The accused propagated a false story that the promotional web pages paid Rs 6 per like. The investors had to pay Rs 5,750-57,500 in the company account to become a member and earn Rs 5 per click.
The accused also promoted four systematic investment plans offering various incentives, depending upon the investment made by the user. These multi-level marketing and ponzi schemes were run by the Ablaze Info Solutions Private Ltd, Social Trade India Pvt Ltd, 3W Digital Pvt Ltd, and Intmaart India Pvt Ltd.
All these companies were the brainchild of Mittal, Ayushi Agarwal, and others.
One of the victims, law student Rohit Bhati, alleged: “When I went to their office, they took me to the second floor, where around 20 people were sitting. They explained that the company got Rs 14 for each promotional link and Rs 5 out of that was given to the investor. If you referred it to two more people, your number of links were doubled.”
Meanwhile, the ED has also sought details of transactions from the banks the accused were using. “The money trail will be investigated,” an ED official said.
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