Kanpur: Cracking another case of credit card fraud, the Special Operations Group (SOG) of the Kanpur Police arrested a gang of five, which tricked credit card holders, took possession of their credit cards and duped them of over Rs. 4 crore.

More than 15 credit cards, ration cards, cheque books, identity proofs and over a dozen passbooks were recovered from the members of the gang. Hanuman Mishra, Ajai Singh, Akhilesh Tiwari, Vijay Pandey and Mohammed Hussain were arrested near a private bank, while the mastermind of the gang, Aman Singh, who owns an electronics shop in the area is still absconding.

Authorities have not ruled out the involvement of a nexus between the bank officials and the gang because the gang obtained the details of credit card holders who have defaulted on payments and these details are usually available with bank officials only. The gang would then pose as bank officials, contact the credit card holders and ask them to pay up the remaining amount. They took cheques toward payments and the credit cards from unwary credit card holders on the pretext of getting them reactivated. The gang members then used the credit cards for various transactions including withdrawing cash.

Credit card fraud is on the rise in India and it is high time that every credit card holder should take precautionary measures so that he is not the next one to be duped. In this particular case, the gangsters posed as bank officials and asked for cheques and the credit cards, which they later misused. The first step in any such situation, is to verify the identity of the person. Keeping the telephone number of your bank or credit card company will also help tremendously as you can immediately call the bank and inquire about the person. Secondly, there is no need to give credit cards to anyone for any purpose what so ever. All the operations regarding the credit card can be done by contacting the customer care. Ignorance among the credit card holders is what these fraudsters thrive upon and a little diligence can go a long way in preventing oneself from such events.