Online gaming fraud: City Police to pursue extradition of fugitive fraudster Sontu

 

 

With an aim to bring the elusive on-line gaming fraudster Ananth alias Sontu Navratan Jain to Nagpur, the City Police, in collaboration with the Ministry of Home Affairs, have intensified their efforts to secure his arrest. A staggering Rs 17 crore in cash, 14 kg of gold and 294 kg of silver collectively worth Rs 27 crore were seized from Sontu’s house in Gondia on Saturday. He was accused in a case of Rs 58 crore on-line gaming fraud case. Sources claimed that the City police are conducting relentless efforts to apprehend Sontu and hold him accountable for his alleged crimes. Sontu, after defrauding a rice trader, managed to evade the police’s grasp by fleeing to Dubai on a tourist visa for a month. Following this discovery, the police swiftly issued a look-out circular, leaving no stone unturned in their pursuit of the fugitive.

 

The gravity of the case prompted the City Police to seek assistance from the Ministry of Home Affairs, leading to contact with the Ministry of External Affairs for Sontu’s extradition from Dubai. Sources believe that Sontu’s days of evading arrest are short, and he is expected to be extradited from Dubai soon. The investigation has unveiled another twist. It has come to light that Sontu had borrowed huge sum of money from thirteen of his acquaintances, some of whom were close friends. The police are now probing the reason behind these financial transactions, investigating whether the loans were genuine or not. Furthermore, the police are recording statements from seven of Sontu’s relatives to ascertain any possible leads in tracking him down. So far, the city based rice trader is the sole complainant, but police are appealing victims to come forward and lodge complaint against Sontu. The seized cash was deposited in the bank on Monday while the gold was to be sent to an auditor to check its genuineness. The police are trying hard to track the servers of Sontu’s on-line application called ‘Diamond Exchange dot com.’

 

The fraud came to light after a victim approached the police. The businessman had affection for gambling. Sontu allegedly convinced the victim to gamble on his on-line gaming application, providing him with a username ID and password after taking an initial amount of Rs 8.50 lakhs. He had borrowed substantial sums from friends and relatives to fund his gambling habit. However, he later realised that the application was designed to manipulate results, ensuring that the player always lost. Feeling cheated and desperate to recoup his losses, the businessman demanded Sontu to return his money, but the latter refused. Sontu had even threatened the victim to kill him if he would not repay the remaining amount of Rs 40 lakh. Somehow, the victim managed Rs 40 lakh from friends and transferred to Sontu through a hawala trader last week. Depresed over the deteriorating financial situation, the victim attempted suicide by consuming sleeping pills. Finally, the police registered the case on the complaint of the victim.