Guwahati: Chandmari Police Arrest Fraud Travel Agent

Chandmari Police arrested a person on Monday for allegedly running a hoax travel agency defrauding customers in Guwahati.

Officials informed that the accused had been running a travel agency named ‘Visa Service and Discovery Tours and Travels’ in Guwahati’s Paltan Bazar area.

He was identified by the police as Angshuman Pal. According to officials, Pal cheated a customer who was looking to travel to the United Kingdom.

The victim was defrauded of Rs 1.8 lakhs in the name of Visa and flight ticket bookings by the accused. The victim had submitted the amount on January 1, however, after no further communication, he got suspicious.

After realising about the fraud, the victim lodged a complaint at the Chandmari Police Station, based on which the police acted to apprehend the fraudster.

Following the arrest of Pal, it came to the fore that he had carried out similar frauds with other victims in the past as well.

He has been kept for questioning and further legal action will be taken in due course, officials mentioned.

It may be noted that in October 2022, as many as five people were arrested in Guwahati in connection with two ATM fraud cases and 68 ATM cards were recovered from their possession.

Police said that the arrested individuals had fraudulently changed the ATM cards of unknown persons to withdraw money.

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Sudhakar Singh, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), Guwahati City Police said that two cases of ATM fraud were registered on October 4 and 5. After thorough investigation of the cases, Guwahati City Police arrested five criminals.

"Two victims Rajib Das and Devendra Kalita had lodged two complaints and said that their ATM cards were changed by some people by showing to extend help them when they went to ATMs to withdraw money. When they returned home they came to know that, Rs 68,000 was withdrawn from one account and Rs 1.10 lakh was withdrawn from another account," he said.

After checking CCTV footage of the ATMs, police identified a car and arrested the owner of the car. After checking the details as to which account the money was transferred, police arrested another person.

"During interrogation, they revealed other persons' name and accordingly, we arrested three other persons last night," DCP Sudhakar Singh added.

The arrested persons were identified as Jiaul Hoque, Lutfur Rahman, Aminul, Hanifur and Shahidul, said police.

Police recovered and seized 68 numbers of ATM cards, Rs 15,000 in cash, three vehicles and six mobile phones in possession from them.

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