Farmer duped of Rs2L by man posing as bank manager

A farmer from Rajarhat has been duped of more than Rs 2 lakh by a person who had posed himself as a bank manager.

The accused had allegedly siphoned off the amount from the account of one Hafizul Mollah, a local farmer, who has an account with Patharghata branch of a nationalised bank. The victim has told the police that on June 11, he had received a phone call from a person who introduced himself as the bank manager.

The accused told the victim that his ATM card would be blocked if he does not provide the details relating to his account. Initially, the victim did not want to provide his account details but the accused convinced him that if his account gets blocked, he would not be able to withdraw money leading to the victim to finally sharing his account details with the accused.

The victim told the police after he shared his account details with the caller that money had been withdrawn in several transactions. The victim came to know about the incident on Wednesday, following which, he lodged a complaint with the police. He also contacted the local branch office but was told that it was difficult for the bank officials to do anything as the victim had shared all personal details with an unknown caller.

The bank officials said that awareness programmes were held repeatedly to make the customers aware about these issues.

The customers are advised not to share any personal details with anybody who calls up a customer posing as a bank employee or official and seeks personal details relating to the account. Bank officials never call up a customer in this manner and ask for bank details. Despite repeated pleas, customers have been repeatedly falling victims to these incidents.

The victim told the police that around Rs 2.13 lakh was withdrawn from his account in 15 transactions. On the basis of the compliant, the police have started a specific case in this regard. They are yet to arrest the accused with the investigating officer going through the telephone call to trace him.

A senior police officer of the cyber crime department said that it is often found that the callers use mobile numbers which are issued in the name of other persons and as a result, it becomes difficult to trace the culprits.