Odisha EOW arrests one from Delhi in fake loan app scam

Bhubaneswar, July 16 (IANS) The Odisha Police’s Economic Offence Wing (EOW) has arrested an accused involved in cheating people through a fake loan mobile app, police said on Friday.

Nitin Mallik, director of Good Start Business Services Pvt Ltd, was arrested from New Delhi on July 13, produced before a local court, and brought to Bhubaneswar on transit remand, EOW officials said.

The arrest was made on the basis of the report submitted by EOW Inspector Pranati Senapati, who was enquiring into an allegation of Sakti Prasad Dash of Bhubaneswar regarding the harassment and mental torture by recovery agents of the digital loan app Kredit Gold by sending him abusive messages and morphed photographs etc.

According to police officials, Dash, after downloading the loan app, received the instant loan amount of Rs 9,000. However, after four days, he received whatsapp messages/calls to pay back Rs 15,627.

Thereafter, he received calls and messages from different mobile numbers which were traced to be the number of a company namely Good Start Business Pvt. Ltd. of which Mallik is one of the directors, they said.

The officials said that Good Start Business Pvt Ltd is not registered as Non-Banking Financial Company (NBFC) with the RBI and illegally operating as a digital lender.

The EOW suspected that Chinese nationals were also involved in the scam. Mallik was in direct and regular touch with at least three Chinese nationals and used to get a huge salary for this job, they said.

The accused was also found to be one of the directors of another company namely Right Start Business Pvt. Ltd. The international gang is running at least 10 such illegal loan apps and there are more than one lakh downloads of the Kredit Gold app alone.

The Odisha Police has seized many incriminating materials like copy of passports of Chinese nationals, agreement copy for virtual space, contract agreements between Chinese and the telecom service providers, Whatsapp chats and emails and several abusive text messages meant for the loanee from the arrested accused.

Mallik, who was allegedly responsible for lending/recovery of loans, is also wanted by different police forces, including Mumbai police, they added.

–IANS

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