In a major development in India’s cybercrime crackdown, a Surat resident, Chetan Gangani, has been arrested for allegedly assisting a network of cyber fraudsters in transferring ₹10 crore to a Pakistan-based cryptocurrency wallet, the Gujarat Police’s CID-Crime division said on Saturday.
The arrest is part of a larger investigation into “mule” bank accounts — accounts used by scammers to launder illicit funds through complex cross-border financial channels.
According to the Cyber Centre of Excellence, Gangani worked with a gang already under investigation for channeling ₹200 crore to Dubai-based cybercriminals through nearly 100 mule accounts spread across Morbi, Surendranagar, Surat, and Amreli districts.
The Crypto Trail: From Gujarat to Pakistan
Officials said Gangani used his BitGet crypto wallet to convert ₹10 crore of criminal proceeds into USDT (Tether) — a popular stablecoin — and transfer the assets to a Pakistan-based wallet over four months.
He allegedly received a 0.10% commission for each transaction, although the total value of his earnings has not yet been disclosed. Police said that the funds originated from scams, including digital arrests, investment frauds, loan scams, task-based job frauds, and gaming-related phishing operations.
A mule account, as defined by investigators, is a bank account used by criminals to receive or launder money, often under false pretenses or with minimal awareness of the account holder.
Wider Crackdown Across Gujarat
Six individuals linked to Gangani were arrested earlier on November 3, accused of routing ₹200 crore to cybercriminals in Dubai using mule accounts. These accounts were allegedly tied to 386 cybercrime cases registered nationwide.
Gujarat Deputy Chief Minister Harsh Sanghavi, who also oversees the Home Department, called the bust a “major cross-border cybercrime breakthrough.”
“The Gujarat Cyber Crime Centre of Excellence has dismantled a large-scale mule account network with direct financial links traced to Pakistan,” Sanghavi posted on X (formerly Twitter).
He said investigators traced the money trail across seven layers, leading from Indian bank accounts to cryptocurrency wallets abroad, exposing a wider ecosystem of cross-border digital laundering.
“The probe revealed a ₹10-crore transfer to a Pakistani Binance USDT account, which has cumulatively received over ₹25 crore from Indian accounts,” Sanghavi added.
Expanding Investigation
Authorities believe the network is part of a multi-country cybercrime operation that converts Indian scam proceeds into crypto assets before routing them to offshore wallets — a pattern increasingly seen in cases involving digital arrest syndicates and fake online job scams.
Officials said more arrests are expected as forensic analysis of wallets, IP logs, and blockchain trails continues.
The case underscores how India’s cybercriminal ecosystem is becoming deeply interlinked with global crypto laundering networks, particularly in Pakistan, Dubai, and Southeast Asia, posing a new challenge for investigators.
