With the arrest of three persons, the police today claimed to have busted a gang that duped people of four states with promises to install telephone towers on their land or home, Senior Superintendent of Police Amol V Homkar said.
The gang allegedly duped around 1000 people in West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha and Jharkhand of Rs 2 crore to Rs 2.5 crore, Homkar said.
Acting on a tip-off, the police arrested three members of the gang from near a hotel here.
The gang used to make people sign an agreement on behalf of 'Avish Enterprises Pvt Ltd', a fake company, and took money ranging from 20,000 to 30,000 from them as security deposit and registration, Homkar told a press conference.
The company with branches at several places employed 40 persons on monthly salary to visit door to door to trap people with promises of monthly rent ranging from Rs 25,000 to 40,000 for installing telephone towers on their land or homes.
The employees, however, were unaware of the illegal activities being carried out by their employers, he said.
The matter came to fore when the people, who had completed the formalities including payment started protesting over the delay in installing the towers, Homkar said.
Sensing that something wrong with the company, the employees also joined the victims forcing the gang members to flee sometime back, he said.
The places where people were duped by the gang included Malda, Murshidabad, Purulia, Burdwan (in West Bengal), Dinajpur, Madhubani, Sultanpur, Patna, Sitamarhi, Jamui, Muzaffarpur (Bihar), Bhubaneswar (Odisha), Lohardaga, Bokaro and Koderma (Jharkhand).
