3 more held for Rs 1.61-cr investment fraud

Three more persons have been arrested for the Rs 1.61-crore stock investment fraud in Panchkula, taking the total number of arrests in the case to five.

The case was registered on June 7 last year following a complaint lodged by Ajay Gill, a local resident, who runs an academy. He had reported that he was added to a WhatsApp group via a Facebook link on April 1, where he was lured with promises of high returns through stock market investments. The fraudsters tricked him into transferring Rs 1.61 crore through separate transactions and misused his as well as wife’s Aadhaar details.

On July 10, three suspects — Sumit and Manjeet from Sisana village in Sonepat, and Pradeep from Thanakalan — were taken into custody. While Sumit and Manjeet were sent to judicial custody, Pradeep was remanded in police custody for further investigation.

Earlier, the police had arrested Kushdeep from Lakhimpur Kheri, Uttar Pradesh, whose account had received part of the funds transferred by the victim. Another accused, Rajat Gupta, was arrested in May.

The police have appealed to the public report such frauds at the cyber helpline 1930 or at the nearest police station.