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In yet another success in the 18Football.com betting (online Ponzi) case, the Economic Offences Wing (EOW), Bhubaneswar has arrested director of a shell company from Kerala.
The EOW has arrested Dileepkumar P (35), who is a diploma holder in Business Management, in connection with the case. He is the director of Kerala-based Shell company- Priwest Global Solution Pvt Ltd.
According to EOW, the private company was used for channelising the ill-gotten money under the online betting racket.
“So far, we have found that around Rs 19.49 crore has been routed using this company. Dileepkumar is also the Founder cum Managing Trustee of Omana Foundation Public Charitable Trust (Coimbatore) which was also used to channelize the crime proceeds of this scam,” said a senior official of EOW.
The preliminary investigation revealed that around 4000 to 5000 illegal transactions were being done in the bank accounts of M/s Priwest Global Solution Pvt Ltd and Omana Foundation Public Charitable Trust.
How EOW Busted 18Football.com Betting (Online Ponzi) Case
Initially, around 800 duped investors from Ganjam district had registered a complaint in connection with the cheating by 18Football.com.
Not only Odisha, investors in different parts of the country fell prey to the scam. How the Scam Operated 18football.com is a hybrid model of fraud where Ponzi scheme (Multilevel Marketing) runs online giving a name of football betting/ gaming APP.
EOW officials claimed that it was a huge international scam running online from a website which has been registered in Hongkong (China) and also operated from Dubai.
Investors Tricked
Investors were promised of giving lucrative benefits like 3% daily compound return on investment, recharge bonus, referral bonus, extra bonus on the earning of the down- line members, salary bonus, daily withdrawal option. Investors need to create an account with “18football.com” either by application or through offline referral link, and were being asked to bet money in some football matches as prescribed in website/ APP.
Investors were also provided with the so called foreigner “mentor” to assist them in betting. These mentors used to communicate through telegram or Apps only.
Promotional Activities by Scamsters
The fraudsters were also taking up the promotional activities like some social works, charity etc to lure and mislead people in the rural areas and giving it huge publicity so that people will consider this scheme as a bona fide organisation. The fraudsters initially paid the promised return for some few days to the investors, yet in the latter stage when the membership increased, stopped making any payment and closed the app “18football.com”.
Mastermind Of Scam
Most of the fraudsters were getting instructions from one Md Sheikh Saif from Dubai.
Based on the request of EOW, the Bureau of Immigration had issued a Look Out Circular (LOC) against Md Saif, the Dubai based operator/ promoter of this scam.
Arrests So Far
Two directors of Kolkata based shell company “Hakim & Rustam Fabrics Pvt. Ltd” were arrested from Kolkata and one director of a shell company “Edudaddy Institute of Advance Studies Pvt Ltd” was arrested from Udaypur, Rajsthan.
Magnitude of Fraud
The fraud by 18football.com has got all India ramifications, and the fraud amount involved is suspected to be more than Rs 1000 crore, out of which EOW has been able to trace transaction of approximately Rs 525 crore till now.
