On May 5 last year, Gurugram resident Umesh Gupta filed a complaint with the station house officer (SHO), Sadar Thana. When his Covid positive cousin's oxygen saturation had started plummeting, he searched online for oxygen cylinders. That is when he got a WhatsApp forward about a 'Mr S. Dasgupta' who was selling cylinders. On May 1, after speaking to him a couple of times, Umesh advanced ₹11,000 to Dasgupta's SBI account. The deal was that the cylinder would reach him within two hours of the advance being credited. But no cylinder was delivered. Umesh called Dasgupta several times, only to be brushed off with vague explanations. The next day, Dasgupta called and demanded another ₹12,000. A suspicious Umesh got a few of his friends to call Dasgupta for cylinders. Each time, Dasgupta would give different account numbers under different names. He also stopped picking up Umesh's calls.
When the SHO took no action, Umesh got an attorney at the Gurugram district court to appeal to the the cyber cell. The cyber cell ignored it, until the attorney moved court. A few weeks later, the judge asked the cyber cell for a status update. The person from the cyber cell was very rude, says Umesh. He seemed unhappy to register my complaint. Right now, I am not pursuing the case to get my money back. I just want to make sure no one else gets cheated by these people.
Umesh's case is not an isolated one. Fraudsters are dime a dozen, offering everything from free coaching classes, online discount coupons and Rs20 lacs loan in just few clicks. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, cybercrimes jumped by almost 84 per cent in two years from 27,248 in 2018 to 50,035 in 2020.
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