Mumbai police nab four foreign nationals in fake job racket

Four foreign nationals have beenarrested from Pune for allegedly cheating several people oflakhs with the promise of jobs abroad, police said onThursday.

A team of the Cyber police from the Mumbai crimebranch raided a flat in Undri area of Pune and apprehended thefour accused on Wednesday, an official said.

The arrested accused include Nigerian and West Africannationals who allegedly got in touch with at least 2,000 jobseekers of various countries and cheated them, the officialsaid.

As many as 14 mobile phones, four laptops, threememory cards, five routers, a data card, two international SIMcards were recovered from the premises, he said.

During the investigation, the police found that theaccused had transferred at least Rs 10 crore to a Nigerianbank, he said.

The accused had collected this amount from job seekersin the form of visa fees, programme fees, employmentauthorisation and travel allowance, the official said.

The racket came to light on January 15, when Chemburresident Vishal Mandavkar approached the Cyber police with thecomplaint of online fraud, he said.

According to the police, Mandavkar had responded to anadvertisement about a job at a prominent hotel in Canada andmailed his resume, following which he was asked to deposit Rs17.22 lakh as visa fee, programme fee, employmentauthorisation and travel allowance.

Once the amount was paid, the contact person stoppedresponding to the complainant's calls, it was stated.

The probe has revealed that the accused had used 64bank accounts of 12 Indian banks across the country to collectmoney from job seekers, he said.

The police have recovered at least 2,500 people'spassport data and other personal details from the accusedpersons, the official added.