Pramesh Jain
In a joint operation carried by Military Intelligence sleuths and Anti Terrorist Cell officials of the Central Crime Branch,busted an international telephone exchange and arrested two persons on Wednesday who were running the racket from BTM layout.
The arrested accused have been identified as Ibrahim,Pullatti,36,native of Mallappuram in Kerala and his associate,Goutham B,27 from Thirupattur, in Tamailnadu.
The accused have rented many places to instal the sim boxes at 30 places.
Bengaluru city police commissioner,Kamal Pant told media persons,our CCB Joint CP Crime, Sandeep Patil received a tip off that some persons are running illegal telephone exchange in Bengaluru.
Based on a tip off,a joint operation was conducted by Military intelligence and Anti terrorist cell team of officials raided six places and recovered 30 SIMboxes,containing 960 SIM cards installed at different places which helps to receive international calls bypassing the telephone routers and convert them into local calls.
Initial investigations revealed that the Ibrahim is part of the international network based in Dubai and is also part of the hawala racket.
Ibrahim worked in Dubai for many years to learn about SIMbox operations and returned to Bengaluru to set up and run the business on behalf of his network.
The accused had even produced hundreds of SIM on fake IDS sourcing them through their contact.
Ibrahim told the officials that he would source the ID proof of the people especially migrant labourers who submit the ID proof at the local SIM dealer to get the connections.
Such IDs photocopies are sourced by Ibrahim to get another connection and use it in th SIM boxes.
During investigation it was found that the accused would charge their customers with Rs.1 per pulse rate against Rs 10 of the international pulse rate and make a huge amount of profit.
Such calls are not only incurring huge revenue loss to the state exchanger but also used for anti-social activities since they are out of radar and not been monitored.
Their customers are individual and small companies which have to make long international calls.
Using the illegal exchange the duo would make a business of Rs 10 to Rs 15 lakh per month. Ibrahim and Goutham would get a salary of Rs. 70,000 to Rs 50,000 per month .
The police have book the duo under various sections of Information Technology Act and telegraph Act and taken them into custody to probe their network further.
Finally,Director General and Inspector General of Police,Praveen Sood,has appreciated, Military intelligence team and Bengaluru City Police Commissioner,Kamal Pant and his team as,Joint CP Crime,Sandeep Patil,DCP Crime-1,KP Ravikumar,ACPs,as,Venugopal,Nagaraj,and other staff who has nabbed the notorious accused which at a time 960 illegally procured SIMS can be used,important detection since this could be used for any illegal or subversive activities a timely action by the team has averted all their plans and a suitable reward will be given to the team for their excellent investigation in busting the racket he added.
