Job racketeers from UP arrested for defrauding 620 people

HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad Central Crime Station (CCS) sleuths arrested Deepak Sharma, a school dropout and chief Executive officer of Uttar Pradesh-based Diginal India Pvt. Ltd, and three associates on charges of defrauding more than 600 people in Telangana of Rs. 15 crore.

Police said the Delhi-based Deepak Sharma through Diginal India offered home-based work of digitising old novels by scanning and converting them to PDF files. The scamsters advertised in the media and sent out bulk SMSs regarding the scheme, and offered Rs. 50,000 per month for digitising 10,000 pages in 25 days. They also offered scanners for free, citing MOUs with NGOs in the United States and Europe.

The catch was that members had to pay `1 lakh caution deposit up front, said Gajarao Bhupal, joint commissioner, CCS. He identified the other accused as Syed Sameeruddin, Ashish Kumar, and Amit Sharma.

When the payments stopped, the investors approached Deepak Sharma. When he gave unconvincing replies, they approached the police.