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Ahmedabad, Nov 18 (IANS) Gujarat’s Cyber Center of Excellence has arrested Neel Purohit – alias ‘The Ghost’ – the alleged kingpin of an international “cyber slavery” network operating in Myanmar’s KK Park and Cambodia.
Deputy Chief Minister Harsh Sanghvi announced that the state-of-the-art centre, built for Rs 500 crore, has broken a global syndicate that lured Indian youth with fake foreign job offers and sent them to cyber-fraud factories run by Chinese mafias in Southeast Asia.
Officials said that this operation was conducted on the instructions of Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, Director General of Police CID Crime KLN Rao and Additional Director General of Police Parikshita Rathore. The team arrested Purohit from Gandhinagar as he was allegedly trying to flee to Malaysia. His two close associates – sub-agents Hitesh Somaiya and Sonal Faddu – were also arrested along with two other accused, Bhavdeep Jadeja and Hardeep Jadeja.
The court has approved Purohit’s remand for 14 days. The investigation revealed that Purohit ran a highly organized international trafficking network, managing over 126 sub-agents across India, while maintaining links with over 30 Pakistani handlers and over 100 Chinese and foreign corporate HR operators who sourced manpower for cyber-fraud compounds.
Police said he had trafficked or facilitated deals for more than 1,000 individuals in Cambodia, Myanmar, Vietnam and Thailand – often sending victims through Dubai, Laos and Sri Lanka.
More than 500 citizens of India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Nigeria, Egypt, Cameroon, Benin and Tunisia were transported into cyber slavery through routes arranged by him.
According to the Cyber Centre, the accused used Telegram, Instagram and Facebook to lure the victims with high-paying data-entry jobs abroad, confiscated their passports and illegally transported them across the borders – often through the Moi River to Myanmar’s Myawaddy region, which is a notorious hub for crypto scams, phishing operations, romance frauds and Ponzi rackets.
Victims were forced to commit cyber crimes by threatening them with physical and psychological torture. For each person trafficked, Purohit allegedly earned $2,000-$4,500, distributed 30-40 percent to sub-agents and funneled the money through the original bank accounts and multiple crypto wallets.
The arrest is significant as more than 4,000 Indians have been rescued in joint operations by India, Thailand and Myanmar in the last three years. In their statements, several survivors named Purohit, helping investigators identify him as a key link in the global racket.
Deputy Chief Minister Harsh Shanghvi congratulated the Cyber Center of Excellence team and called the action “a historic step” to protect citizens from growing cyber threats and criminal syndicates.
–IANS
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