Task Force busts credit card fraudsters’ gang

 Hyderabad: In a major breakthrough, the Hyderabad Task Force police on Thursday busted a gang of credit card fraudsters who swindled banks of Rs 1.52 crore following a complaint from a private sector bank. According to Hyderabad Police Commissioner VV Srinivasa Rao, Kumbham Ranga Reddy (32), the kingpin of the scam had swindled the amount from four banks which had issued credit cards to him.

Ranga Reddy, after dreaming up the operation, set up a shell company M/s Parnika Nano Systems Pvt Ltd and registered it with Registrar of Companies of Ministry of Corporate Affairs in April 2013. He then opened a current account and obtained a point of sale (PoS) machine commonly known as swiping machine. He then collected the photographs of 40 neighboring shop workers who included tea vendors and barbers. He then approached GHMC outsourced employees to issue voter Id cards for them by bribing them. 

Similarly, he also obtained PAN cards in the names of his neighbours. With the voter Ids and PAN cards, he opened HDFC bank accounts for them, showing them as his employees. To gain the trust of the bank officials, he used to deposit monthly salaries into the newly-opened bank accounts. Subsequently, he also applied for credit cards and obtained from four financial institutions including HDFC Bank, SBI, Standard Chartered Bank, and the RBL Bank. 

Then the accused used to swipe the card on his own swiping machine and get the money transferred into his account. In this fashion, accused siphoned off Rs 1.52 crore, from October 2013 to February 2015. After reaching the credit limit, he would throw away the card and would not pay the bank. As the addresses are fictitious, the collection agents would be on a wild goose chase.

The Police Commissioner said: “Initially, one bank has approached us regarding the scam. During the investigation it was revealed that they have also cheated other banks. Without the involvement of bank officials, it would not be possible for the accused to cheat to such a great extent.

Our teams have arrested all the criminals whoever were involved in the scam. We are also trying to seize the accused person's properties in order to recover the amount swindled. So far we have recovered Rs 6.9 lakh from the accused persons.” 

The arrested were: Kumbham Ranga Reddy resident of Turkayamjal, Hayathnagar, Thipparthi Vinay Kumar Reddy resident of Hastinapuram, Meka Santhosh Reddy - an internet centre owner, resident of Hayathnagar, Varikuppala Srikanth - a GHMC outsourced employee, Makkala Naresh - a GHMC outsourced election cell employee, Gopatoti Kishore Babu - HDFC bank employee, Gorantla Sailesh Kumar - HDFC credit card wing employee, Reddypally Sandeep Kumar – sales executive of SBI credit card, and Muddunuru Paramesh Kumar resident of DLRL colony, Meerpet.