A 57-year-old woman from Bengaluru fell victim to a highly sophisticated 'digital arrest' scam, losing nearly Rs 32 crore over a harrowing six-month period. Fraudsters impersonating officials from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) kept her under round-the-clock video surveillance and coerced her into executing 187 bank transfers.
The ordeal began in September 2024. The woman, a software engineer by profession, finally approached the police earlier this year after realising she had been systematically defrauded.
It started with a phone call from an individual pretending to be a DHL executive. The caller claimed that a suspicious parcel addressed in her name had been intercepted at the company’s Andheri centre in Mumbai. The parcel, he alleged, contained three credit cards, four passports, and a quantity of the prohibited drug MDMA.
When the woman firmly denied any knowledge of the parcel and clarified that she resided in Bengaluru, the caller warned her that her phone number was directly linked to the consignment and that the incident could be classified as a serious “cybercrime”. The call was promptly transferred to another person who introduced himself as a CBI officer and declared, “all evidence is against you”.
The fraudsters threatened her with immediate arrest and warned her not to contact local police, claiming that dangerous criminals were keeping her house under surveillance. Terrified for her family’s safety—especially with her son’s wedding approaching—she obeyed every instruction.
She was directed to install Skype and add two specific IDs, after which she was forced to remain on a continuous video call for months until the platform was shut down in May this year. A man identifying himself as Mohit Handa monitored her activities for the first two days, followed by another impersonator named Rahul Yadav, who kept watch for an entire week. The primary handler, who posed as a senior CBI officer named Pradeep Singh, constantly pressured her to “prove her innocence” by complying with financial demands.
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Between September 24 and October 22, 2024, the woman disclosed all her banking and financial details and began transferring substantial amounts. From October 24 to November 3, she was instructed to deposit a “surety amount” of Rs 2 crore, followed by additional payments disguised as various “taxes”.
Under relentless coercion, she broke her fixed deposits, liquidated mutual funds and other savings, and ultimately transferred a total of Rs 31.83 crore through 187 separate transactions. The scammers repeatedly assured her that every rupee would be refunded after completion of a so-called “verification process” by February 2025. They even promised to issue an official clearance letter before her son’s engagement ceremony in December and sent her a forged document to maintain the illusion.
The constant video surveillance and psychological manipulation left her severely distressed. She became mentally and physically unwell and required a full month of medical treatment to recover.
“All this time I had to report over Skype where I was and what I was doing. Pradeep Singh was in touch daily. I was told that the money would be returned by February 25 after the completion of all procedures,” the woman said.
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After December, the fraudsters shifted goalposts again, demanding more money as “processing charges” and pushing the promised refund first to March and then indefinitely. Communication ceased abruptly a few days later.
The victim waited patiently until her son’s wedding in June was over before approaching the authorities and lodging a formal complaint.
“In total, through 187 transactions, I stand deprived of approximately Rs 31.83 crore,” she stated in her police complaint, urging a thorough investigation into the matter. The Bengaluru Police have now registered a case and launched a detailed probe into this elaborate and sophisticated cybercrime racket.
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