Karnataka: Woman gets scratch card via post, loses Rs 40 lakh over seven months

BENGALURU: If you receive a scratch card of any online shopping firm, offering prizes by post, beware! Fraudsters may be trying to get your personal details and short-change you by citing various charges to be paid to receive the prizes, as a 51-year-old central Bengaluru woman realised after losing Rs 40.5 lakh.
Pallavi (name changed), a private firm employee, in her complaint to Central CEN Crime police said she lost the money to fraudsters between Nov 12, 2023 and June 19, 2024.
Pallavi received a post at her residential address on Nov 12 last year. She found an envelope purportedly from ‘Meesho’, an online shopping platform. She found a scratch card and a letter, which stated that the company is organising a lucky draw for its registered customers on its eighth anniversary, and she had been shortlisted.
There were three major prizes — Rs 15.5 lakh cash, a car and a scooter. Pallavi scratched the coupon and found Rs 15.5 lakh cash prize mentioned on it. She contacted two numbers mentioned in the letter. The fraudsters also mentioned that Pallavi must pay 4% tax to claim the prize amount, 1% in advance and 3% afterreceiving the prize money.
The fraudsters, posing as helpline staff, asked her for coupon details, a photo of the coupon and her Aadhaar card and bank account details.
Pallavi sent them and they got back to her in sometime, saying they had verified her details, and they would bepaying her the prize amount. They asked her to pay 1% of the prize amount as tax and gave her an account number. She initially paid Rs 15,000. Then they asked her to pay CGST and SGST. Later, they told her that RBI has blocked the amount as they need a no objection certificate (NOC) and asked her to again transfer the money. Citing various such reasons, the miscreants made her transfer Rs 40.5 lakh in all to 26 different bank accounts over seven months. The last payment she made was on June 19. Upon realising she was cheated, she lodged a complaint on June 22.
Homemaker loses₹2 lakh
In a similar case, a 26-year-old homemaker, residing in RT Nagar, ended up losing Rs 2 lakh. She had also received a scratch coupon of Rs 15.5 lakh on Dec 2 last year. She lodged a complaint with DJ Halli police on May 24. Police and bank officials are struggling to recover the money as the crooks have transferred and withdrawn it from the accounts. Meesho, on its website, has mentioned about the scam and asked its customers to be careful and verify communications received in its name.
GST official’s iPhone robbed at Richmond Circle
A scooter-borne miscreant robbed an iPhone from a 36-year-old man, working as tax assistant in the GST department in Tirupati, at Richmond Circle recently.
In his complaint to Ashok Nagar police, G Yashavant said his iPhone was robbed around 11.40pm on June 22 in front of Udupi hotel.Yashavant’s family stays in Wilson Garden and he visits them once a week. On June 22, he came from Tirupati and got down from the bus at Richmond Circle. He was waiting for a cab to go to his house. A motorist on a black scooter with no helmet saw him standing alone with a phone in his hand. He rode past Yashavant, snatching his phone and sped away towards Shantinagar, the complaint said.
One of his relatives, working abroad, had got him the phone a month ago. Yashavant said, “I ran behind him for almost 100 metres, but he managed to escape. The next day, I filed a police complaint.”
CCTV footage from the spot has provided some leads to police. Efforts are on to nab the miscreant, said a senior officer.