‘Loan fraud’: 5 booked

Kolkata: Five persons were arrested on Tuesday night for allegedly duping a youth of over Rs 2 lakh by promising to arrange a loan of Rs 8 lakh.

The accused were remanded in police custody for five days after being produced before the concerned court.

According to police, Sayan Adhikary, a resident of Ballygunge in Howrah, lodged a complaint at Narayanpur Police Station on Tuesday. He alleged that a group of individuals had cheated him under the guise of arranging a loan through a private company. Adhikary told the police that while searching online for a loan agent, he came across the contact of a man identified as Pradyut Ghosh. After he reached out, Pradyut introduced him to another person named Rahul. Adhikary then applied for the loan and was subsequently asked to make several payments by two other individuals—Navin Mull and Praveen Mull—allegedly as processing and clearance charges.

Adhikary further claimed that the accused made a video of him in which he was coerced into saying that he would not lodge any police complaint if the loan was not sanctioned. On July 23, Adhikary was called to the Narayanpur area by the accused, where he was allegedly confined in a room and forced to write an apology letter. Again on Tuesday, the accused reportedly tried to contact him multiple times. Adhikary, however, ignored the calls and approached the police.

Preliminary investigation suggests the accused may be part of a larger racket involved in similar loan scams.

The five are currently being interrogated to ascertain the extent of their operations.