The south cyber police of the Mumbai Crime Branch arrested two men for allegedly threatening an 86-year-old woman from South Mumbai with the registration of a money laundering case against her and her children, and extorting over Rs 20 crore. The police said that the accused even claimed to have digitally arrested her inside her house to force her into transferring the amount.
According to police officials, the two arrested individuals are Shayan Jamil Sheikh (20) and Rajik Azam Butt (20), residents of Malad (West) and Mira Road (East), respectively. Butt is believed to be part of a larger international racket, as it has been found that he had created a group of 13 foreign nationals on the messaging app Telegram, through which he allegedly shared information about Indian bank accounts to facilitate further fraudulent activities.
The police said that the alleged fraud of Rs 20.25 crore took place between December 26, 2024, and March 3, 2025.
The officials stated that the accused, who posed as police officials, first contacted the 86-year-old woman late last year and falsely accused the octogenarian of being involved in a money laundering operation.
“The callers claimed that her Aadhar card and other personal information had been used to open a bank account in her name at Indian bank. They told her that a large-scale money laundering operation had been carried out using this account and that police action was imminent,” said a police officer.
In an attempt to create fear, the accused threatened to file a police case against her and her family members, including her daughter. They used scare tactics, including a fabricated “digital arrest,” to coerce the woman into transferring the money into their accounts.
“Between December 2024 and March 2025, the victim was tricked into transferring a total of Rs 20.25 crore. However, when she came to know that she was being duped, she filed a complaint with the National Cyber Crime Reporting Platform, following which she approached the south cyber police station to lodge a complaint,” an officer added.
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During the course of the investigation, police officials learned that the money was transferred to various bank accounts, one of which belonged to Shayan Jamil Sheikh.
An officer said, “About Rs 4.99 lakh of the fraud amount was transferred to his account. Following this, we started looking for him. We found his address, but he was not present at that location, after which we apprehended him from the MHB Colony in Malad’s Malwani area.”
Upon interrogation, Shayan admitted to withdrawing Rs 4.99 lakh from the account and giving it to his accomplice, Rayan Arshad Sheikh, who then handed it over to another suspect, Rajik Azam Butt.
“We worked on those leads, following which a search operation led us to Rayan and Rajik’s location near Saubhagya Park Housing Society in Mira Road. During the operation, both the accused tried to escape. While Rayan managed to flee, Rajik was apprehended on the spot,” an officer added.
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The police then began scrutinising the mobile phones recovered from Shayan and Rajik. They discovered that Butt was connected to an international fraud network. Investigators found that he had created a group of 13 foreign nationals on the messaging app Telegram, through which he allegedly shared information about Indian bank accounts with masterminds based abroad.
“It appears that Rs 4.99 lakh and Rs 6.98 lakh, which were transferred to Shayan’s and another suspect’s accounts, were facilitated by Butt to the masterminds based abroad via the Telegram app,” an officer said.
Claiming that both the accused are members of an international fraud gang and were directly involved in the conspiracy and execution of the crime, the officials added that they are probing to determine how many more bank accounts have been provided to masterminds based abroad.