Ahmedabad: Fake love gurus, a bogus yoga guru, and men hiding behind women’s online identities have come under the scanner of Ahmedabad’s cybercrime unit. They allegedly slipped into women’s inboxes, sending obscene clips, messages and threats. But their digital trails eventually led cybercops to their doors.Ahmedabad police have arrested eight people from Gujarat and Rajasthan as part of ‘Mission Cyber Rakshika – #SecureHerSpace’, a special drive aimed at protecting women from cyberstalking, bullying, impersonation, blackmail and online sexual harassment.Among those arrested are two alleged repeat offenders who, police said, targeted women with publicly accessible social media profiles.One of them, Suresh Puri, allegedly cycled through 10 fake identities in six months and contacted around 300 women. Police said he bombarded them with nude photographs and videos of himself, obscene audio clips and offensive messages.Keyur Lakkad allegedly adopted a different disguise. He is accused of creating eight accounts in women’s names and using them to contact the female friends of women with publicly visible profiles. By posing as a woman, police said, he sought to gain their trust and misuse their identities and social connections.The other six accused were allegedly closer to home. Police withheld their names because they were former husbands, former boyfriends or relatives of the complainants, and identifying them could compromise the women’s privacy.The cases surfaced after the women approached the Ahmedabad cybercrime unit. Officers first counselled them and recorded their complaints without disclosing their identities. Police then sought details from social media companies and sifted through account records and other technical data to identify the people allegedly controlling the fake profiles.Teams were dispatched to different districts of Gujarat and Rajasthan. The searches culminated in the arrest of the eight people. Police also got the offending accounts and posts removed from social media platforms.Earlier cases under the mission involved other elaborate online disguises. Two men arrested in Rajasthan had allegedly styled themselves as ‘love gurus’ to lure and target women.In another case, a man arrested in Delhi allegedly posed as a yoga guru on Instagram. Police said he used the fake persona to obtain personal photographs from women and then used artificial intelligence to create fake nude images. He allegedly sent the manipulated images to a complainant.The drive was launched by police commissioner Anupam Singh Gehlot, joint commissioner of police (crime) Sharad Singhal, DCP Lavina Sinha and ACP Hardik Makadia.Police said Mission Cyber Rakshika was intended to provide women with a confidential channel through which they could report online abuse without fear. The cybercrime unit assured complainants that their identities would be protected and prompt legal action taken against offenders.
