641 ATM cards, Rs 1 crore fraudulently taken out in 4 years; 5 held

Nikhil Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, August 20

The Ludhiana Commissionerate has arrested five racketeers who had made fraudulent withdrawals of over Rs 1 crore during the past four years.

The swindlers had made fraudulent withdrawals from ATMs through genuine ATM cards without affecting the bank balance.

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The expose has unveiled the defects in the banking security system. 

The accused have been identified as Pankaj Kumar of Chandar Nagar, Johny Goyal of New Chandar Nagar, Satish Aggarwal of Shakti Vihar, Vijay Garg of Durga Puri and Rajesh Kumar of Lakshmi Nagar. Satish and Johny are former journalists with vernacular newspapers.

Satish is already facing an ATM fraud case in Dehradun while Pankaj is facing four cases, including two ATM fraud cases in Patiala and Dehradun. The police seized 641 ATM cards of 18 banks, 166 cheque books, 117 passbooks, three cars, three ID cards of newspapers, a licensed revolver, Rs 3 lakh in cash and eight phones.

The conmen would insert an ATM card and the moment the machine would be about to dispense the cash, they would cut the power supply. They would get the money, but the slip would show “transaction declined”. Later, they would approach the bank and get a “refund”.

“We have informed banks about the security flaw,” Police Commissioner RN Dhoke said.  

The modus operandi

• Accused would open bank accounts of their near and dear ones at various banks on the condition that they would keep ATM cards 
• Conmen would give 10-15% of fraudulent withdrawals to the account holders 
• They would go to Delhi, Mumbai and elsewhere to withdraw cash
• They would insert an ATM card and when the machine would be about to dispense the cash, they would cut the power supply 
• Swindlers got the money, but the ATM slip showed “transaction declined”
• Later, they would approach bank to complain of getting the message of withdrawal, but no money 
• As bank did not have any record of withdrawal, the bank used to refund money