45-year-old woman loses over Rs 18 lakhs in 'scratch card' scam in Bengaluru

Bengaluru: A 45-year-old woman lost over Rs 18 lakh after she fell for an elaborate lottery fraud that lasted over three months.

The incident came to light after Sanjana S (name changed) from Annapurneshwari Nagar in western Bengaluru filed a police complaint on May 7.

On January 28, 2024, an unsuspecting Sanjana received an envelope claiming to be from Meesho, an online e-commerce platform, as per the FIR seen by DH. Inside the envelope, she found a letter with instructions, contact details and a scratch card.

Sanjana decided to try her luck. She scratched the card and found a message that she had won Rs 15.51 lakh.

She then called 90*******5 mentioned in the letter and got in touch with the scamsters, who urged her to share a photograph of the letter, scratch card, the envelope she received and her government-issued ID card like Aadhaar for further verification to 83*******3. Sanjana did as told. 

Sensing the victim was trapped, the scamsters spun a new lie. They allegedly told Sanjana that since the lottery, lucky draws etc were illegal in Karnataka, she wouldn’t be able to claim 4 per cent of the lottery amount and had to pay a 30 per cent tax to avail the rest.

The sale of lotteries in Karnataka was banned in 2007.

Sanjana agreed and began transferring the money. In some instances, the scamsters told her that the tax amount wasn’t credited and she had to repay it.

Hoping she could compensate for the loss from her lottery winnings, Sanjana did the scamsters’ bidding.

Between February 9 and April 8, Sanjana sent the scamsters Rs 18,40,168, police said, adding that the sum was wired through RTGS from Sanjana’s Canara Bank and SBI bank accounts to seven SBI bank accounts.

“They used to call the woman regularly updating her about the process and telling her that she would get money soon,” a cybercrime investigator told DH. “To keep her engaged, they told her that some documentation was lacking and would ask her to send it again. They said she had to pay various fees to claim the winnings.”

“Throughout, the victim believed she won the lottery and kept engaging with the scamsters, hoping she would get money,” the officer said. Sanjana sought help of cybercrime police on May 7 as the scamsters went incommunicado.

A case has been registered under sections 66C (punishment for identity theft) and 66D (punishment for cheating by personation by using computer resource) of Information Technology (IT) Act and sections 419 (punishment for cheating by personation) and 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) of IPC. 

“The victim gave us transaction IDs instead of bank account numbers by mistake,” the police officer said, urging the public to be wary of such schemes. 

“We submitted those to the bank. We are also verifying the mail trail. We tried to reach the victim a few times over the phone, but she has yet to respond.”