City painter arrested in ₹2 cr cyber fraud gets bail

Mumbai court grants bail to 44-year-old painter, Surendra Bapu Surve, arrested for ₹1.98 crore cyber fraud; police allege involvement in a complex banking scam.

MUMBAI: The sessions court on Monday granted bail to a 44-year-old painter arrested in connection with a cyber fraud of ₹1.98 crore.

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The accused, Surendra Bapu Surve, was arrested on June 6, 2024, based on a complaint of banking fraud lodged on April 22, 2024. He was booked under section 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing the delivery of property), 467 (forgery of valuable security, will, etc.), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating), 469 (forgery for purpose of harming reputation), 471 (using as genuine a forged document), 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the Indian Penal Code along with Section 66 (D) (cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act.

According to police, another accused, Neha Shukla, had allegedly lured the complainant to invest in shares through their app by showing fake profits. However, it was Surve who encouraged the complainant to transfer ₹1.98 crore through the app, purportedly for investing in shares. The police report showed that the fraud of ₹1.98 crore was committed using various bank accounts, out of which, an amount of ₹74.50 lakh was found to be credited in Surve’s bank account. Stating the involvement of Surve in commission of offence, the police highlighted the seriousness of the offence.

Advocate Het Rajeshbhai Gala, representing Surve, submitted in the bail application that he is not very familiar with the technology and, therefore, had no knowledge of the mobile application mentioned, functioning of online banking, and transactions with his bank account. He claimed that one Javed was the mastermind behind the racket and submitted that Surve was not the beneficiary of the fraud.

The police stated that Surve needed to be investigated further for finding out what computer tools and sites/platforms were used by the arrested accused in the crime.

Surve’s bail application was earlier rejected by the metropolitan magistrate, Dadar.