Veteran Bollywood actor Rakesh Bedi, who played the role of an intelligence officer from Pakistan in the highly acclaimed movie Uri: The Surgical Strike, fell prey to cyber fraud recently. It also left him with a loss of Rs 85,000 (USD 1,020).
As per the complaint filed by the thespian, the fraudster introduced himself as an Indian Army personnel. The actor approached the police with his grievance after realising that he was conned.
As per his official statement to the cops, the accused fraudster identified himself as Aditya Kumar, belonging to the Indian Army. Kumar also shared his government and Army ID cards, and pictures of himself in Army uniform with Bedi.
The accused told Bedi that he had obtained his contact details from an online housing portal where the actor had listed a flat owned by him in Pune for sale.
How did he lose the money?
Bedi stated that the conman called him on December 25, 2023 and asked him to share photos and details of the flat as he was interested in buying it.
After expressing that he wanted to purchase the flat, the accused asked Bedi to initiate a Re 1 transaction to his Army account via Google Pay. He then assured the actor that he will pay the token money of Rs 50,000 (USD 600) via the same UPI app.
When Bedi informed him that he had not received any money, the accused stated that since it was an Army account, the bank accounts of both the sender and the receiver needed to have a similar balance, thus convincing Bedi to send him Rs 50,000.
The conman also asked Bedi to make additional transactions of Rs 25,000 (USD 300) and Rs 10,000 (USD 120), under various pretences, and the actor did them, only to realise that he had been scammed.
When he tried to confront the fraudster, he ceased all communication, post which Bedi filed an official complaint with the Oshiwara police in Mumbai on December 30.
(The article is published under a mutual content partnership arrangement between The Free Press Journal and Connected to India)