Gurugram police with the employees of the fake call centre (Photo Courtesy: @gurugrampolice) | Photo Credit: Twitter

Key Highlights Gurugram police believe that the fake call centre in Sector 49 duped over 300 people Laptops, mobile phones and SIM cards along with cash were recovered during the raid The masterminds were IT professionals whose start-up ran into losses last year

Gurugram: The raid on a fake call centre in Haryana's Gurugram on Tuesday has revealed the dark underbelly of India's startup-culture. According to statements made by police, the kingpin of the fake call centre busted in Gurugram's Sohna Road launched the operation of duping people after his start-up encountered massive losses last year.

Employees of the fake call centre made cold calls and offered to enhance their resumes for a refundable fee. However, when customers called them for a refund, the employees continued to bide their time by keeping them busy in inconsequential procedural jargon. After multiple complaints were made about the website, it was taken down and a new placeholder went online in its place.

Police suspect that they may have duped over 300 customers. During the raid on Tuesday, sleuths recovered 10 laptops, 10 SIM cards and ₹1.5 lakh in cash from the fake call centre on Sohna Road. Assistant commissioner of police Karan Goyal identified the two masterminds of the operation as Amir Tufail and Pankaj Kumar. Both of them had launched a start-up firm in 2018 which aimed to offer technical support and helpdesk services to other firms.

However, their idea could not take off and they were staring at massive losses and mounting debt. This is when they came up with the plan of duping people on the pretext of enhancing their professional credentials. They even gave customers false assurances and job guarantees to secure the 'refundable' fee which never saw its way back to the customers.

The issue of fake call centres mushrooming across the country was raised earlier this month in the Rajya Sabha and response in this regard was issued by Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad who said that the police and governments are taking steps to curb this menace and protect people from getting reeled into such phishing scams.