The lost and found scam: Police tool used to defraud those looking for missing relatives

After a tense, sleepless night, 52-year-old Markandey – a former security guard – received a phone call at 9am last November that soothed his broken heart. The caller told him that his 21-year-old daughter, who had been missing from their home in Sant Nagar in south Delhi for over 24 hours, was being tracked by the “Missing Persons’ Cell” of the Delhi Police that the caller was a part of.

- Karn Pratap Singh and Hemani Bhandari

A fraudster like none other

From a dingy room in Mau, UP, with a phone, a few SIM cards, and a stable internet connection, Shyam Sundar Chauhan allegedly called 904 people who were looking for their missing family members of which he duped at least 50 to the tune of 10 lakh by posing as a cop.

He sympathised with Markandey, asked for his daughter’s photo and name, and resuscitated a father’s dying hope.

What followed were two calls in a span of a few hours: “We are still looking for her, hold tight,” followed by “your daughter has exited Chandigarh in a car, we are following her – but we need money for petrol, you know how the Delhi Police is, send ₹8,000.”

Desperate as any parent would be to reunite with their missing child, Markandey pushed his doubts aside, and sent the caller ₹8,000 via a UPI transaction.

He nervously waited for a call, an update, his daughter’s voice from the other end of the phone. “We are still following her,” the man who had taken Markandey’s ₹8,000 told him twice.

By evening, Markandey’s calls went unanswered, and with that his hopes were crushed.

In another corner of Delhi, the same month, and under similar circumstances, a missing minor girl’s parents paid ₹10,000 to the caller; and the father of a 30-year-old man sent ₹40,000 to the caller who said the police team was headed to Manali in Himachal Pradesh to bring him back.

The caller was not a police officer. The caller was never in Chandigarh, chasing Markandey’s missing daughter’s car; and was he never in Manali looking for anyone’s son.