ED arrests 3 more, including a CA, in Goa digital arrest probe
The Enforcement Directorate’s Panaji office has arrested three more people accused of being part of a nationwide money-laundering network. This group is suspected of converting proceeds from “digital arrest” cyber fraud into cash and foreign currency. Bhushan Suryakant Moye, a chartered accountant, along with Vilas Narayan Pawar and Shailesh Dagdu Chavan, were taken into custody on August 27 under Section 19 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.
A special PMLA court in Goa has ordered that the three remain in ED custody until September 1. With these arrests, five people have now been detained in the case. Earlier, Fahim Moin Hussain Sayed and Naim Mueen Sayyed were arrested on August 23 and are still in custody. The investigation started with FIR No. 17/2025, filed on June 9, 2025, at the Cyber Crime Police Station in North Goa. In this case, a Goa resident was kept on a video call, convinced she was under investigation, and forced to transfer Rs 2,60,33,634 between May 21 and June 2, 2025, into accounts falsely called “Secret Supervision Accounts.”
ED investigators say the victim’s money entered an organised apparatus designed to receive cyber-fraud proceeds as banking credits, convert them into cash, and then convert the cash into foreign currency through companies holding Reserve Bank of India licences as Full Fledged Money Changers. The funds were fragmented across more than 400 beneficiary accounts and routed into companies whose directors of record were persons of no means; the accounts were operated by others so that the proceeds of crime would appear untainted. Those same entities’ accounts figure in 330 victim complaints, and 163 first information reports filed across more than 20 states and Union Territories. Reported losses in those cases total Rs 417.49 crore.
The network’s banking transactions total more than Rs 27,850 crore. Earlier, the ED reported cash deposits of about Rs 2,904 crore, including Rs 584.70 crore deposited through 61,448 bulk-note-acceptance-machine transactions at different locations. The agency says Moye set up 21 companies using identity documents provided to him and treated these companies and their 43 dummy directors as a single group, filing their tax returns together rather than separately. Pawar handled the RTGS transfers that moved the illegal funds into the network’s accounts, while Chavan provided cash for those transfers. All three had their premises searched on August 21.
The ED said that money laundering continued even after searches on July 17, right up until just before the first arrests on August 23. This made it necessary to question the suspects in custody. Earlier searches under Section 17 of the PMLA took place at 20 locations in Mumbai and Goa on July 17, and at more places on August 21. These searches found Rs 3.25 crore in cash. Accounts linked to the syndicate with over Rs 30 crore were frozen. Investigators also seized digital devices, account books, financial records, and statutory registers, which are still being examined.
This case shows a common pattern in digital-arrest frauds. Callers impersonate officials, keep victims on continuous video calls, show fake documents, and convince them to transfer large sums by claiming the money is going into official “supervision” accounts. Law enforcement agencies have repeatedly said that no real agency would arrest someone over a video call. People who get such calls should hang up and report the incident to the national cybercrime helpline at 1930.
The investigation is still ongoing. Because there are so many records to review and the banking and cash trails are so large, more arrests and asset seizures may happen. The ED has not yet said where the foreign currency ended up or named the licensed money changers involved. Officials say these details are still being investigated.
