The Karnataka State Cyber Command uncovered a significant cyber fraud case where a 74-year-old woman in Bengaluru was defrauded of Rs 24 crore by scammers posing as officials from central investigation agencies. The arrested individuals include N. Shivanam from Erode, Akkach Mallik from Mumbai, Palak Bhai Patel, Amit Narendra Patel from Ahmedabad, Om Prakash Rajut from New Delhi, and Gaurav Kumar from Bihar. Punab Mohanty, IPS, Director General of Police, Cyber Command, Bengaluru, released an official statement regarding the incident.
According to the Karnataka State Cyber Command, the victim, identified as Lakshmi Ramamurthy, fell prey to cyber criminals who impersonated officers from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED). Over a span of more than two months, the accused coerced her into transferring large sums of money. The fraudsters managed to extract Rs 24 crore from her ICICI Bank account through 26 transactions to 23 root accounts across 10 different banks nationwide between February 10 and April 24, 2026.
The fraudsters attempted to extort more money from the victim even after the substantial transfers. On April 24, as she was about to transfer an additional Rs 3 crore using a gold loan, alert ICICI Bank officials notified the Cyber Command unit, leading to the prevention of the transfer. This timely action saved Rs 3 crore from falling into the hands of the fraudsters. Following a complaint, the Cyber Command initiated an investigation, tracking the movement of funds in first-tier accounts.
With the help of the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCRP), authorities froze multiple root accounts and recovered approximately Rs 4 crore. Through court orders, an additional Rs 1.46 crore was retrieved, bringing the total recovered amount to over Rs 5.46 crore. During the probe, police confiscated six mobile phones believed to have been used in the criminal activities from the arrested suspects.
