A veterinarian who is busy cracking cyber crimes in Pune

Meet the new deputy commissioner of police heading the cyber crime cell, economic offences wing (EOW) and the anti-narcotics cell, Sanjay Shinde. He hails from Sangli and initially worked as a veterinarian in the state animal husbandry department. But in 1990, he cleared the Maharashtra Public Service Commission examination and was inducted at the rank of deputy superintendent of police. Shinde also has a law degree from University of Pune and completed a course in Masters in Computer Application from Punjab University. He tells DNA about how the department cracks cyber crime cases.

Please throw light on the cyber crime and economic offences in the city?
Both these crimes are on the rise and are mostly committed by computer savvy and educated people. One of the most common crimes committed by suspects is to create fake profiles of those with whom they have enmity.

The main intention of creating such profiles in different social networking sites is to defame them. The suspects display vulgar pictures of the victim, phonographic films and comments that eventually makes the victim depressed.

Moreover, online frauds are also common where victims are duped by promising jobs abroad and lucrative cash. We would like to appeal to residents not to get carried away by such emails and fall into the trap.

They should ignore such mails without any second thoughts. In EOW, majority of the cases pertain to frauds in housing loans.
We have been getting several cases where loan seekers are taking loans from different financial institutions on the same property and mortgaging it repeatedly. Such offences have increased as prices of land and property have increased.

How does the department tackle such crimes?
Cracking cyber crimes or economic offences are unlike routine ones. Such crimes are committed by the suspects who are well-versed in computers or seek help of experts.

Many of the suspects committing cyber crimes are well-educated and have an IT background. We have a well-trained staff that has enormous knowledge in tackling such cases. We also seek help from experts. Furthermore, internship programme involving college students too is helping us in solving some of the cyber crime cases.

What are your future plans as far as cyber crime is concerned?
We recently organised a month-long anti-narcotics awareness camp involving 1,700 city students. On similar lines, we are planning a cyber crime awareness camp among the college students of the city.

It would organise seminars and lectures on cyber crime. Our main intention is to make these students aware about the legal consequences if the social networking sites are misused.
We have prepared a special module for them to understand how the cyber crime cell functions and cracks cases.