Online betting racket busted, 13 arrested in Amritsar

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Amritsar, December 1

The city police busted an online betting racket and arrested 13 persons, all residents of Chhattisgarh who were operating from a rented accomodation in Palm Grove Colony located on Airport road here.

All the suspects were booked on charges of fraud, gambling and criminal conspiracy. They were brought on police remand for further investigations. The police seized five laptops, 17 mobile phones and three wifi modems besides other electronic items from the house.

The racket was busted after a tip-off provided by the residents of the area who informed the police commissioner about the movements of suspicious elements in the area.

Police Commissioner Jaskaran Singh said the suspects used to run an online betting mobile application Fairplay and used to cheat people by getting them involved in betting huge amounts on different games including cricket and football besides other online games.

The police said 13 youths in the 18-36 years age bracket namely Anil Kumar Jatta of Chhattisgarh was the mastermind. A commerce graduate, he was an expert in computers. Among others arrested included Aman Kushwaha, Abhay Rai, Ashish Kumar, Saurav Yadav, Alok Kesarwani, Nikhil Soni, Tirlok Singh, Ankit Manji, Sonu Sardar, Sumant Kumar, Manpreet Singh alias Kalu and Kuldeep Singh alias Goldy have been held.

The police commissioner said the racket used to lure people especially youth from Punjab, Delhi and Chhattisgarh to gamble their money on live matches of cricket, football and casino. They used to make different IDs for money transactions.

The police have registered a case under Sections 420, 120-B of IPC, Section 7 (3) of Lottery Regulation Act, Section 3, 4, 13 of Gambling Act and 66 (D) of the IT Act at Airport police station here.