Surat: The Cybercrime police arrested 10 people on Friday night and busted a racket running a call center under the name of a study center called ‘Learn N Earn.’

The call center, operating in the Althan area of the city, would contact job seekers, offering them “English speaking and personality development courses” along with job promises. They made the job seekers enter into a contract, after which they were pressured to pay certain ‘fees.’ If they refused, a bogus legal notice would be sent to intimidate them into paying.

Police arrested 10 callers, namely Shaishav Chauhan, Kushal Pandey, Khushbu Bhalodiya, Mukesh Tambakuwala, Prashant Shrivas, Ashish Patel, Mayank Kumar, Shehzad Vadsariya, Ravi Sahani, and Kaushal Pandey. In the operation, police also seized 59 mobile phones, 3 laptops, 12 debit cards, 30 SIM cards, seven cheque books, and two bank account passbooks.

“As the call center had been operating for the last two years, we believe hundreds of candidates were extorted. We have learned that 50 people worked as callers. We are still searching for Pravin Singh, Abhay Sharda, and Kiran Patel. Based on digital evidence, we estimate the extorted amount could run into lakhs,” a police officer said.

The police have booked 13 people under sections 319 (2), 318 (4), 336 (2), 336 (3), 340 (2), 308 (2), 338, 61 (2), and 54 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, as well as the relevant sections of the IT Act for extortion and criminal conspiracy. DeshGujarat