New Delhi, May 13 (IANS): With the arrest of eight persons from Delhi, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, the Delhi Police have busted a gang which used to dupe people on the pretext of investment and online gaming, an official said on Friday.

The official said that Akash (22), Bheem Kumar alias Jeetu Yadav (23), Samim Khan (23) and Mohd. Tariq Ansari (37) were arrested from Chhattisgarh; Gulam Muinuddin (22) and Mohd. Shoib were apprehended from Hamirpur in Uttar Pradesh; Ritik (22) was nabbed from Delhi while Tushar (22) was apprehended from Gondia district in Maharashtra.

According to the police, complainant Mayank Rahella, a resident of Delhi's Shahdara area, filed a complaint wherein he said that he read a message over a Telegram group that investment would be doubled within three hours. Therefore, Rahella paid Rs 20,000 there but received nothing and was cheated by some unknown person.

"During investigation, it was found that the complainant's money was transferred to an account in Jharkhand and again transferred to an ICICI Bank account in Jahangirpuri, Delhi. On the basis of call detail records and live location of registered number of the alleged ICICI Bank account, eight members of Telegram investment fraud gang were nabbed from Rohini, Delhi, on Wednesday," said Rohit Meena, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Shahdara).

Upon questioning, the accused revealed that they used to contact the victims over WhatsApp and offered them to earn money through investment and online gaming.

"After that, they added the victims in a Telegram group and said that other members of the group are earning good profits in a short span of time. The victim fell into their trap and transferred money as per their instructions and lost his hard-earned money," the DCP added.

The gang also lured the victims to earn money through online gaming.