The Special Task Force (STF) of the Odisha Crime Branch has busted a huge multi-State racket of mule bank accounts with the arrest of three persons.
The arrested were identified as Sk Hapizul and Sk Jahangir of Olamara in Baleswar district and Sk Jamiruddin of Rampura in West Medinapur of West Bengal.
Mobile phones, pre-activated SIM cards, bank passbooks, Aadhaar Cards were seized from the possession of the accused.
The racket has been active in Odisha, Jharkhand and West Bengal, especially in the districts of Baleswar, Mayurbhanj in Odisha, East Midnapore, West Midnapore in West Bengal, East Sighbhoom, West Singhbhoom and Sareikela in Jharkhand.
“Sk Jamiruddin of West Midnapore is the alleged mastermind, who employed around 10 to15 people at 15,000 per month to open bank accounts. These members visit various interior areas of these district, targeting poor villagers/tribal and persuading/luring them to open bank accounts. Villagers are generally offered Rs 2,000 for giving their documents and opening one bank account. However, the mobile numbers linked with bank accounts are provided by gang members,” the STF said.
The gang then used to sell these bank accounts along with the connected mobile numbers to various cyber, cyber-financial and sextortion scammers and other criminals based in Kolkata and other parts of India.
“They use social media platform like WhatsApp group, Facebook pages, Telegram channel to sell the mule bank accounts. They charge Rs 15-20,000 per account,” the STF said.
“So far, they have sold around 5,000 mule bank accounts on different platforms. It has also come to the notice that the scammers frequently changed the bank accounts. Generally, they abandon a bank account once it reaches a transaction of Rs 1 lakh. Sometimes, the accounts get frozen even before that by concerned banks on the request of police or law enforcement agencies,” the agency added.