Police in Gurgaon have arrested six men accused of engineering a large-scale fraud by exploiting a technical flaw in the MobiKwik payment application, investigators said Tuesday. The scheme, which authorities estimate at over Rs 40 crore, involved approximately 2,500 bank accounts that have since been frozen. Officials reported recovering Rs 8 crore so far.
The accused, identified as Rehan, Mohammad Sakil, Wakar Yunus, Wasim Akram, Mohammad Amir, and Mohammad Ansar, were taken into custody on Monday. A police spokesperson confirmed that the men admitted to exploiting a loophole that allowed transactions to proceed even without adequate balances or correct credentials.
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How the Fraud Was Detected
The case came to light when MobiKwik conducted an internal audit on September 12. According to police, auditors flagged a pattern of suspicious transfers in which failed transactions were incorrectly recorded as successful. This anomaly enabled fraudulent credits to merchants’ accounts, which were subsequently diverted to personal bank accounts.
A written complaint was filed the following day by a company representative at Sector 53 police station, leading to the registration of a case under Sections 318(4) and 314 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. These provisions relate to the cheating of a valuable security and the dishonest misappropriation of property.
Investigators swiftly traced the money trail to thousands of beneficiary accounts. By Tuesday evening, 2,500 such accounts had been frozen. Police sources said the magnitude of the fraud could rise as the inquiry continues.
Expanding the Investigation
On Tuesday, the six accused were presented before a local court and remanded to judicial custody. Officials emphasized that efforts are underway to identify others linked to the network, including merchants who may have knowingly participated.
The incident follows an earlier case reported in August, when Policybazaar Insurance Brokers filed a complaint about impersonation and forgery schemes targeting customers in Gurgaon. While the financial scale of that fraud was smaller, police said both cases underscore the growing sophistication of cyber-enabled crimes targeting India’s fintech sector.
Authorities are now working in coordination with banks and digital platforms to strengthen security checks and ensure that loopholes of this nature are not exploited again.