Uttarakhand: Eight held for swindling Rs 1 cr from banks using ATMs

Eight members of a gang, alleged to have fraudulently withdrawn around Rs 1 crore from ATMs of different banks in the past fifteen days, were arrested in Uttarakhand's Udham Singh Nagar district, an official said on Monday.

The gang had targeted several ATMs in Nainital and Udham Singh Nagar, he said.

Police have seized Rs 1.36 lakh cash, a car, two motorcycles and 61 ATM cards from the accused men, Additional Superintendent of Police Devendra Peecha said.

They were also arrested in Kanpur earlier, he said.

Explaining the modus operandi of the gang, Peecha said this is "one-of-a-kind case" of fraudulently withdrawing money from ATMs in Uttarakhand.

The gang members borrowed debit cards from people known to them. After inserting the card in the machine and selecting 'withdraw' option, they used to immediately cancel the transaction, the ASP said.

They used to pull out currency notes from the cash dispenser of the ATM and then call the bank complaining about the debit despite cancellation of transaction, Peecha said.

He said the bank would then credit the amount back in the same account in the next 24 hours.

On Sunday night, a police patrol team intercepted a Uttar Pradesh-registered car occupied by six men on the basis of suspicion, Peecha said.

He said when the police questioned them they appeared nervous and on being frisked, several ATM cards of different banks were found from them.

The accused then revealed that they are residents of Kanpur and two of their friends were out to withdraw money from an ATM, Peecha said.

The other two accused were later caught from Kashipur road overbridge here, he said.

The gang members then told police that in the last 15 days, they had stolen around Rs 1 crore from different ATMs, the ASP said.

He said the accused were identified as Kishan Kashyap, Rahul Kannaujia, Jeetu Yadav, Ravi Kumar, Ashish alias Aman, Rohit, Ravikant and Shivam.

A case was registered against them and they were sent to jail, Peecha said.

The police have also notified the Reserve Bank of India about the fraud, the officer added.

In another incident, some unidentified people attempted to loot the main branch of a cooperative bank which is located barely 200 metres away from the official residence of sub divisional magistrate in Kotdwar area of the state's Pauri district, police said.

The matter surfaced when the bank reopened after two holidays on Monday, they said.

The unidentified people were not successful in taking the money kept in the bank's vault, but they took away two guns of security personnel kept inside the bank.