Kolkata bank fraud: Two Romanian nationals held in Delhi
Kolkata, Aug 3 (IBNS): Kolkata Police's Special Investigation Team (SIT) on Friday evening detained two Romanian nationals from Delhi for fraudulently withdrawing money from the accounts of at least 78 customers of several nationalized and private sector banks, officials said.
According to reports, two Romanian men were held from Vasant Vihar area in south west Delhi while they were going towards an ATM counter.
"We have detained two Romanian men from south Delhi in connection with the Kolkata bank fraud and seized at least 20 'cloned' ATM-cum-debit cards, several magnetic strips of ATM cards, two Romanian passports, mobile phones, sim cards and two black masks, what they used during their operations, from their possession," a senior official of Kolkata Police told IBNS.
"We are interrogating the duo in Delhi to get information about the entire bank fraud gang," the officer added.
Since Monday, at least 78 complaints of fraudulently withdrawal were registered with several police stations in Kolkata as well city police's Anti Bank Fraud section.
After beginning probe into the case, Kolkata Police had formed a SIT to probe the matter and deputed a team of senior investigators to Delhi to bust the fraudsters' gang.
City police said that around 18-20 lakh rupees of at least 78 Kolkata bank customers were fraudulently debited from few Delhi ATMs.
Police identified three ATM kiosks- Punjab National Bank (PNB) ATM at Mullick Bazar, Canara Bank ATM at Golpark and Kotak-Mahindra Bank's ATM at south Kolkata's Elgin Road- where fraudsters installed skimming device and micro-cameras to capture customers' ATM cards' details and to know confidential PIN respectively.
"They used 'cloned' ATM cards to debit money from bank customers' accounts," a city police official said.
Meanwhile, PNB officials claimed that money refund process to the savings accounts of victim customers have been started.
"As many as 31 persons, including 19 customers and 12 employee-senior officers, of our bank registered complaints of fraudulently withdrawal at PNB's Mullick Bazar branch and we have started refunding their money," a PNB official told IBNS.
Canara Bank's officers said that their money refunding process was in progress and it will be completed in next few days.
Officials of the State Bank of India (SBI) said that they will install at least 500 'anti-skimming' ATM machines at its ATM counters across West Bengal.
Meanwhile, two ATM booths at Jagadishpur and Kona area under Liluah Police Station limits in Kolkata's twin city Howrah were reportedly looted on the wee hours of Friday.
According to reports, besides damaging CCTV cameras, ATM machines' hard disks and CPUs, miscreants broke two ATM machines and robbed as many as 70 lakh rupees.
Local police, however, have started investigation into the incidents.
(Reporting by Deepayan Sinha)
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