Elderly woman falls for conman's 'love', loses Rs 94 lakh

September 8, 2016

Pune, Sep 8: If you think something is too good to be true, chances are that it probably is. A 64-year-old widow from the city learnt this lesson the hard way recently.

lovemoneyThe Chatushrungi police have booked a person named Harley Benson, who claimed to be from London, for allegedly duping the elderly woman of Rs 94.5 lakh after promising to marry her. The woman lodged a police complaint on Tuesday.

The suspect had befriended the woman, a resident of Model Colony, off Fergusson College Road on Facebook. Benson and she exchanged cellphone numbers and began sending SMSs and Whatsapp messages to each other in May 2016.

According to police, he professed his love for her a couple of months ago and promised to marry her. Benson won her confidence by claiming that he was willing to relocate to India.

As the woman's daughter is based in the US and her husband died in 2014, she lives alone in the city, police inspector U B Shingade said.

The woman was earlier employed as a teacher in a prominent research institute of the Union government and has now retired. police said.

On July 27 this year, Benson called her up and told her that he was shifting to Pune and was carrying gold and diamonds worth 95,000.

After a couple of days, he called her up again claiming that Indian customs officials had caught him at the Delhi airport and were demanding a fine for the gold and diamonds.

Benson claimed that he was not carrying a large amount of money and requested her to pay the fine.

The complaint said that Benson provided her a few bank account numbers and requested her to deposit money in them. The woman deposited Rs 94.5 lakh in the account numbers provided by him over some period. After receiving the money, he switched off his cellphone number.

Police said that the woman sold a piece of land to pay the money. Police have obtained details of the bank accounts and have launched a manhunt to trace the suspect.

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Agencies
July 17,2020

New Delhi, Jul 17: The first FIR against Volkswagen and Audi in India for installing cheat devices in their cars to misrepresent emissions has been filed in Noida.

The FIR was filed by Noida resident Aniljit Singh against the top officials of Volkswagen and Audi in India and their headquarters in Germany. These include Rahil Ansari, Brand Director, Audi India, Balbir Singh Dhillon, Head, Audi India, and Bram Schot, Chairman, Audi AG.

The FIR reviewed by media agency cites forgery, cheating and criminal conspiracy under various sections of the Indian Penal Code.

The complaint has cited the global emissions scandal where VW was found to be installing a cheat device in its cars, in the absence of which, the cars produced 10-40 times emissions beyond the permissible limits.

The complainant said that in 2018 he had purchased seven Audi cars worth crores of rupees. At the time of taking the delivery, the complainant said that he inquired if the cheat devices were installed in India and he was told by the company that they were not, as in India's emission norms were not as stringent and the country being a growing market for Audi, no such device was implanted.

The complaint said that the authorities in India observed that Audi cars' emissions for nitrogen oxide were 5-8 times the permissible limits and after the National Green Tribunal imposed a penalty of Rs 500 crore on VW, the complainant realised that he had been duped of his hard earned money.

He alleged that the accused persons had misrepresented the complainant by forging the documents and devices and caused wrongful gains to themselves and wrongful losses to the complainant. These officials had made wrong records to capture the market, with malafide intent and under a pre-planned conspiracy had induced and defrauded the complainant.

The accused persons are guilty of cheating the customers and have induced the complainant to part with hard earned money for sub-standard cars. The accused are also guilty of forging the documents on which they had sought various clearances.

The complainant has demanded that the allegations may be thoroughly investigated by a senior official.

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News Network
April 12,2020

Bengaluru, Apr 12: Two police officials have been booked for murder in connection with the alleged custodial death of a theft accused in Bengaluru rural district, police said on Saturday.

A case of murder has been registered against inspector Raghu and sub-inspector Rakesh C for the alleged custodial death of Munikulla on Friday afternoon, Superintendent of Police, Bengaluru rural district, Ravi D Channannavar told reporters.

"Yes. A case has been registered and transferred to CID," he said.

Munikulla, a resident of Nadavatti village, was picked up by the police on April 7, his wife Dhanalakshmi told the media on Saturday.

"Policemen took my husband with them. They beat him up and killed him," she said.

Alleging that Munikulla was a victim of police high- handedness, Hoskote MLA Sharath Bachegowda said he had lodged a complaint with the state DGP Praveen Sood demanding a CID inquiry into the case.

An FIR was registered against Munikulla on Friday evening based on a complaint by the cashier of the liquor store, who had claimed that the CCTV footage showed victim's involvement.

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News Network
May 6,2020

Bengaluru, May 6: Central Crime Branch Police have nabbed 71 people involved in various crimes taking advantage of Lock-down which prevents movement of people in the street and seized stolen properties worth about Rs 1.70 crore, official said on Wednesday.

Police said that in all 56 cases were booked. In all 17,312 duplicate Sanitisers, 2000 lts of Chemicals, 18,750 fake Masks, 270 Thermometers and two cars were seized from the arrested culprits.

During the raid godowns where rice and dal meant for free distribution during lock-down were robbed and stored were also seized.

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