Thane, Feb 2 (PTI) Thane police have arrested a 33-year-old man for allegedly cheating a number of jewellers and hoteliers in various states to the tune of about Rs 25 lakh by tampering with the digital payment mode, an official said on Wednesday.

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One of the victims had lodged a police complaint here in Maharashtra of being cheated of Rs 97,330, Vartak Nagar police station's senior inspector Sadashiv Nikam said.

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The accused, identified as Subramaniam Ramakrishna Iyer, allegedly used to purchase jewellery items or book hotel rooms and then tamper with the digital payment mode while paying the money, he said.

After rejection of his payment for the purchase or booking for want of required funds, he would make the payment of Re 1 in any other account.

He would then allegedly tamper with the successful transaction and change the name of the payee and the amount in it to indicate the payment as successful, the official said.

The accused would then present the tampered transaction screenshot to a hotel or jeweller to pose as if the payment was done, he said.

He made use of an app to merge both the failed and successful transactions and create a third screenshot that looked similar to the one indicating successful payment, the official said.

The probe also revealed that similar offences were registered at the Shivaji Park and NM Marg police stations in neighbouring Mumbai, he said.

The accused had allegedly cheated 14 jewellers and 32 hoteliers from various places, including in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Chhattisgarh, Delhi and Rajasthan, the official said.

So far, he was found to have cheated various people worth around Rs 25 lakh and the count was still on, he said.

Based on the complaint, the accused was arrested on Monday and a case was registered against him under provisions of the Indian Penal Code and the Information Technology Act, he added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)