Surat man held for aiding Rs 10 crore crypto transfer to Pakistan

Gujarat police arrested Surat resident Chetan Gangani for assisting cybercriminals in transferring Rs 10 crore to a Pakistan-based USDT wallet. Part of a wider crackdown on mule accounts, the probe revealed links to over Rs 200 crore laundered to Dubai-based fraudsters.

Ahmedabad: Police have arrested a resident of Surat in Gujarat for allegedly helping a gang of cyber fraudsters transfer Rs 10 crore to a Pakistan-based cryptocurrency wallet, officials said.
Chetan Gangani was taken into custody as part of an ongoing investigation into ‘mule’ bank accounts being used by scamsters to launder proceeds of cybercrime, Gujarat police CID-Crime’s Cyber Centre of Excellence said in a release on Saturday.

The accused had links with six persons, arrested on November 3 from Morbi, Surendranagar, Surat and Amreli districts, for allegedly routing Rs 200 crore to Dubai-based cybercriminals using nearly 100 mule accounts, the release said.

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A mule account is a bank account used by criminals to receive, transfer, or launder illicit funds with or without the knowledge of the account holder, according to officials.

Gangani helped the cyber gang members arrested earlier convert Rs 10 crore into cryptocurrency USDT, or Tether, and then send it to a Pakistan-based wallet through his “BitGet crypto wallet” over four months, the release said.

He received a commission of 0.10 per cent on each USDT, it said. The police did not disclose the total monetary value of his commission.

According to the police, the six persons held earlier had provided 100 mule accounts to cybercriminals across Gujarat. These accounts were used in 386 cases, including digital arrests, task frauds, investment frauds, loan frauds and part-time job scams, registered across the country.

Gujarat Deputy Chief Minister Harsh Sanghavi, who handles the home portfolio, on Saturday said the CID-Crime has cracked down on a “major cross-border cybercrime network”.

“In a major breakthrough, the Gujarat Cyber Crime Center of Excellence has dismantled a large-scale ‘Mule Account’ network operating across multiple districts Morbi, Surendranagar, Surat, and Savarkundla with direct financial links traced to Pakistan,” he said on X.

The cyber crime team “meticulously tracked the money trail” through seven layers, from initial Indian accounts to cryptocurrency (USDT) transactions, he said.

“The probe revealed transfer of Rs 10 crore to a Pakistani Binance USDT account, which has cumulatively received over Rs 25 crore from Indian accounts and this gang being one of the major sources,” Sanghavi added.