Five Assam Villagers Arrested for Defrauding HSBC Bank of ₹1.27 Crore
Accused in Their 20s and 30s Used Forged Documents to Obtain 55 Credit Cards, Enabling Upscale Shopping and Transfers to Fake Accounts
MUMBAI: Five Arrested in ₹1.27 Crore HSBC Credit Card Scam from Assam
In a masterminded operation, the Mumbai Crime Branch has arrested five men hailing from a far-off village in Assam‘s Morigaon district for allegedly running a high-profile credit card scam that cheated global banking major HSBC to the extent of ₹1.27 crore.
The accused, who are all in their 20s and 30s, according to investigators, include Mohebur Abdul Rahman (28), Sadiqul Islam (27), Ilyas Rafiqul Islam (25), Abu Bakr Siddique Ramzan Ali (37), and Mohimuddin Ahmed Abdul Malik (26). They allegedly used digital loopholes and identity fraud to obtain 55 HSBC credit cards with fake documents. The cards were used for extravagant shopping sprees and covert fund transfers into a network of fake bank accounts.
The men were presented before an Assam court on Thursday and given a week‘s transit remand. They will be taken to Mumbai on Saturday by the Crime Branch for further inquiry.
The Modus Operandi
The operation of the gang was cleverly simple but frighteningly efficient. Police indicated that the suspects started by selecting people with high CIBIL scores. They used this information to create PAN cards and other supporting documents, which were then used to secure Aadhaar cards from a now-shut down fake Aadhaar centre in Morigaon district. This centre is thought to be one of a larger racket.
Armed with these doctored identities, the gang approached HSBC and other financial institutions for credit cards. They took temporary lodgings in Mumbai to pick up the cards and disappeared soon after the cards were delivered. All 55 of these cards were issued between February and June 2024. “After getting the cards, the accused went on a planned shopping spree—spending, transferring money, and exhausting credit limits before disconnecting with the city,” said police inspector Sadanand Yerekar of Crime Branch Unit 3.
The FIR in the case had originally been lodged in 2023 in Azad Maidan police station on a complaint by an HSBC staff member. A concurrent investigation by Unit 3 of the Crime Branch later tracked down the suspects to Assam. Using forensic banking analysis in conjunction with mobile location tracing, investigators detected a pattern, observing that identical digital trails had surfaced in previous cases with Aditya Birla Finance and Axis Bank.
Deputy Commissioner of Police Datta Nalawade, who coordinated the probe, said, “We had concrete evidence—bank statements, mobile usage records, CCTV footage, and forged documents. As soon as the case was tight, our team acted and arrested the accused.”
Police suspect that this group could be only one node in a much larger syndicate that is active in 15 to 20 villages in Morigaon district. In the past four months alone, more than 200 individuals have been arrested by the Assam police for such banking frauds, suggesting a growing hub of cybercrime activity.
The arrested men have been booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code including 420 (cheating), 465 (forgery), 468 (forgery for cheating), 471 (making a false document), 120(b) (criminal conspiracy), and 34 (common intention). They also stand to be charged under sections 66(c) and 66(d) of the Information Technology Act, 2000.
