Sacked BSF constable arrested for siphoning off lakhs from retirement funds

A Delhi Police special cell busted a nexus of cyber criminals involved in siphoning off about Rs 70 lakh from a large number of Permanent Retirement Account Number (PRAN) of Border Security Force employees and arrested the mastermind behind it.

The accused Ghanshyam Yadav, 33, a native of Prayagraj, was a BSF constable, before being sacked from the services in 2019 for being absent without permission.

A car bearing the sticker of police, six SIMs, one pair of police uniforms with UP police badge, four mobile phones, a Wi-Fi router connected for the commission of the offence, two forged rubber stamps, one Adhaar card in name of assured identity Shyam Singh, one PAN card in name of Kumari Savita Sinh, and two debit cards,

"The cheated amount parked in three accounts in Kotak Mahindra bank, IDFC First bank and Union Bank of India, have been frozen," a police officer said.

Delhi Police said he used the identity of his woman friend and her late father-in-law for committing the crime and, he himself, was living under the assumed identity of Shyam Singh. He got prepared an Aadhar card on his assumed identity to evade the reach of the police to him.

A complaint was received from the NPS Section, PAD BSF to DCP/IFSO wherein it was alleged that Rs 70 lakh (approximately) had been fraudulently siphoned off from Permanent Retirement Account Number (PRAN) through 89 fraudulent transactions of 65 employees of BSF through online facility of Partial Withdrawal of accumulated funds by self-declaration/authentication under National Pension Scheme during the Covid period.

"Accused was posted as a constable in BSF in 122nd Bn. in Malda, West Bengal in May 2019 when he was dismissed from services. During the same period, he got the login credentials of DDO of 122nd Bn. of BSF during his visit in the accounts branch of the unit. He got unauthorized access to the NPS portal through stolen credentials of DDO of 122nd Bn BSF and got himself familiar with all features and functions of the NPS portal," Delhi Police said in a statement.

"He learned about the vulnerability in NPS online system in getting access in DDOs account through change in security questions and exploited the same to get unauthorized access in five more DDO's accounts of BSF," the statement read further.

The accused was also found wanted in another case pertaining to preparing a forged appointment letter for a BSF constable in lieu of receiving a huge amount from the aspirant.

( With inputs from ANI )