Thane call centre scam: accused stalling probe

The five arrested accused who ran a fake call centre Stage Door Communications Private Limited SDCPL which was exposed by midday were produced before the Metropolitan Magistrate court in Thane on Thursday and remanded in police custody till March 18 Crime Branch officials also recovered seven cell phones and a laptop from the houses of the three team leadersInterestingly the SDCPL scam might have been uncovered two years back had the Naupada police heeded information given by the accused in another similar caseA Crime Branch official said that the Naupada police had been tipped off about the fake call centre SDCPL which had been duping people mainly farmers for the past five yearsIn August 2018 the Naupada police raided a call centre at Naupada and arrested four accused including Deepak Singh 28 Maruti Shelar 28 Dipak Giri 21 and Imtiaz Qureshi 27 They had duped several people using the same modus operandi as SDCPL They had told the Naupada police that they were only running a small call centre but there was a big call center in Wagle Estate which was running a huge scam in crores of rupees said the officialFalsely implicatedThe defence lawyer argued in court on Thursday that his clients including directors Ganesh Tiruvalli and Ganesh Manjrekar and team leaders TL Gyaneshwar Kamble Dheeraj Singh and Tushar Sonvane of SDCPL were falsely implicated in the caseSDCPL was only selling insurance policies to customers over the phone They have 100 people on the list to whom they sold the insurance policies and only failed to give a policy to victim Arbaaz Zafar Shaikh who registered FIR an against SDCPL Singh the defence lawyer said in courtThe accused Ganesh Tiruvalli Ganesh Manjrekar Gyaneshwar Kamble Dheeraj Singh and Tushar Sonvane were remanded in police custody PicRajesh GuptaCountering the claims the senior inspector of Thane Crime Branch unit 1 Nitin Thackeray said We have retrieved the Call Data Records CDRs of the mobile numbers used by the cheaters and till date identified 20 victims who have been duped by themIn his argument Singh further added that the TLs at least should be granted bail immediately as they are employees of SDCPLPolice demand acceptedSeeking remand of all the five accused Thane police told Judge RH Jha that the money made from duping people was withdrawn from Kolkata and a team needed to visit the addresses of persons there who withdrew it The involvement of other accused cannot be ruled out Hence the police remand of all the five accused is required for further investigation of the matter Thackeray urged the court Judge Jha agreed to the demand and sent the accused in police remand till March 18Sources in the Crime Branch told midday that its team held combing operations at midnight at the office of SDCPL which has been shut downThe accused are not cooperating in the investigation said an official who further added Initially the team leaders were dodging our questions But after severe interrogation they revealed where the cell phones were concealed We went to the houses of the three TLs and recovered the seven cell phones and a laptop used in the crimeWe have requested for the Call Data Records CDRs of all the seven mobile numbers Our Cyber Cell will also scan the social media accounts in the recovered smart phones the officer addedFiveNo of arrested accusedCatch up on all the latest Mumbai news crime news current affairs and also a complete guide on Mumbai from food to things to do and events across the city here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updates