Kerala: Police make arrests in online lottery gambling case, several other cases of lottery frauds reported in state

A number of online lottery gambling cases have surfaced in the Malappuram district of Kerala. It has also been reported that there is a three-digit gambling gang operating in the state. Several reports of arrests relating to it have been reported from various districts.

Burudadari, the engineer who created the mobile app for online lottery gambling, has been taken into custody by the police along with 25-year-old Alisseripurai Shahal from Thiruvananthapuram. The head of the Malappuram district police said that the duo have been arrested on the basis of information obtained from the suspects who were recently taken into custody in connection with lottery cases.

According to reports, Shahal works as an officer for an IT company. He made the software application for the leader of the gang, Ahmed Shafi who paid Rs 1 lakh as compensation for the software and still pays Shahal tens of thousands every month.

As per the information obtained by the police, the accused were locating agents all over Kerala. The police also disclosed that they had begun the process of freezing the accused persons’ bank accounts.

Meanwhile, the three-digit lottery fraud gangs are reportedly expanding throughout the state. The fraud involves rightly predicting the final three digits of the winning lottery number. The individual predicting those digits correctly receives a winning amount of up to Rs 5000.

The gangs involved are using WhatsApp groups and operating under different names. A large number of complaints about these gangs have been made to the police in the state so far, as reported by Oneindia Malayalam.

On the other hand, there is another gang in Kottayam city which uses forged lottery tickets to obtain money. Fraudsters print fake winning lotteries and present them to lottery agents with an aim to receive the prize money. The gang generally targets elderly and visually impaired agents.