Chinese Connection: Three Arrested For E-gambling, 800 SIM and Paytm Barcode Recovered

KOLKATA: West Bengal Police arrested three men in Nadia’s Karimpur area on Sunday for online gambling and cash fraud and recovered 800 SIM cards and numerous Paytm barcodes from them.

The police acted after getting an information about a syndicate reportedly involved in internet gambling with operations in China.

According to sources, adjacent homeowners called the cops after getting suspicious of the three teenagers who lived in the same residence.

Accused have been identified as Ramen Karmakar, Mujibur Sheikh, and Manabendra Sarkar, all in their early 30s. They were produced at Tehatta court and were sent to five days of police custody.

The three men, all in their early thirties, were charged with fraud and forgery, according to the police. The Krishnagar district police’s cyber crime unit has been tasked with questioning them about the nature of the scam.

According to police sources, during preliminary interrogation, the trio admitted to defrauding customers via UPI-based interfaces such as Paytm. They also admitted to having connections with internet gambling colleagues based in China. This prompted investigators to contact the cybercrime unit.

“The trio also claimed to have defrauded innocent people of their credit or debit card details and card verification values (CVV) by impersonating bank officials,” a police officer said.

According to a sleuth, it is not immediately clear who their victims are. “However, we took the situation seriously after noticing multiple cases that registered for online illicit gambling with indicators pointing to Chinese links across the country in the recent past.”

According to a police officer from Karimpur, they are attempting to determine the amount of money siphoned thus far in this case, as well as the bank accounts into which remittances have been transferred.

“The source of the SIM cards and Paytm barcodes, as well as how they obtained such large quantities, are also being investigated,” he added.

According to a police official with experience in cybercrime, online gambling is typically done by creating secure groups on WhatsApp or Telegram. Officials said the group admins refer to websites, on which group members are allowed to play games and place bets. To avoid the surveillance of Indian authorities, domains of these sites are generally located in China and payments are routed through India-based gateways like Paytm. The benefit earned is usually transferred to several linked bank accounts to avoid scanners of income tax.

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