Mumbai: A 35-year-old labourer, who used to occassionally fly down from Odisha to Mumbai for duping ATM users here, was arrested by Dindoshi Police recently. Sambhav Kumar Acharya was on the run for the past four years, police said. He was nabbed from a hotel in Naigaon, Palghar, where he was currently staying. With Acharya’s arrest, four unsolved cases of cheating registered at Dindoshi, Kasturba Marg, Vanrai and Kurar police stations have been solved.The latest incident was reported on Feb 20 at an ATM in Malad East. A senior citizen was at the ATM to withdraw money when Acharya offered to help him. He memorised the 71-year-old complainant’s Pin number and discreetly swapped his ATM card with a blank one. Later, the senior citizen noticed that Rs 40,000 had been fraudulently withdrawn from his bank account. He lodged a police complaint.A Dindoshi police team, comprising sub-inspector Ajit Desai, and supervised by DCP Mahesh Chimte and senior inspector Mahendra Shinde looked through their files. They found that the accused’s image that was captured on cameras around the ATM centre matched that of a wanted criminal on their records. They had his old mobile number in their files and started analysing the phone records. Police also went through footage from close to 60 to 70 cameras for a period of one month prior to the crime to trace the accused’s movements. Eventually, police learnt that Acharya shunted between Odisha and Naigaon. They found his location in a hotel here and apprehended him. They recovered 25 ATM cards and two phones from him.
