INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
A black Verna halts next to the glass doors of an airconditioned grocery store
On this rolling rural Aravali landscape, both seem out of place to a visitor but draw no second looks from locals, who carry on with their
lives next to such ostentatious displays in one of India's most backward district
From the Verna emerge five young men
They sport styled haircuts, spiked, shiny and strand-perfect, that look like an import from a parlour in Gurgaon or Delhi rather than a
salon in Luhinga Kalan, a village that sits in a rocky part of Nuh near the Haryana-Rajasthan border
The men breeze into the store and walk out minutes later with cans of energy drinks
In a district with high unemployment, almost two-thirds of its population below the poverty line, and a limping local economy riven by a
water crisis, the car and the drinks are a lifestyle statement that sprung up implausibly during the pandemic months.Houses with cams and
'guards' keep a watch on visitors here At Luhinga Kalan, as well as in the roads of neighbouring villages like Luhinga Khurd and Mahun, a
KTM bike can suddenly pop out from behind an auto (these correspondents spotted five)
Hairstyling is evidently a good business idea, from the salons one frequently spots, some of them promising haircuts and beard trims like
Bollywood stars and Indian cricketers.Outside the clusters of village houses, a construction boom appears poised to annex more of the rocky
Dozens of houses are taking shape along the roads, many multi-storeyed and resembling the city 'kothis'
Along the rocky road that takes one further towards the Rajasthan border, new-found affluence manifests in glimpses - houses, cars, bikes,
haircuts - like cherry blossoms in a desert.Much of this, police suspect, has come from the savings of thousands of conned Indians,
primarily over the last three years.These three villages are part of a contiguous set of 40 - in Nuh and the adjoining Rajasthan districts
of Alwar and Bharatpur - to which hundreds of thousands of scam calls have been traced by police from virtually every Indian state
The biggest known hub of cyber fraud in the country today, the area has come to be referred to as 'new Jamtara' (after the Jharkhand town
from which organised cybercrime emerged as a major threat).On April 27 this year, Haryana Police raided 300 places in this area in its
largest field operation against cybercrime and detained 125 suspects, 65 of whom were later arrested
In May, police linked the 'new Jamtara' network to around 28,000 cybercrime complaints and 1,346 FIRs filed across all Indian states and
Union territories, except Lakshadweep."During interrogations, the accused told police that they consume crates of energy drinks to stay
awake and work round-the-clock
Some of them invested their earnings to build big houses, while some of them purchased power-motorcycles
Others bought pieces of land," said Nuh superintendent of police Varun Singla (a grocery store owner in Mahun these correspondents spoke to
said demand for energy drinks is high).Singla added that many KTM bikes had made it to the market for re-sale since the raids
The manager of a KTM showroom in Gurgaon, said they sell 3-4 bikes on an average in a month to customers in Nuh
KTM has opened a service centre in Sohna
"Two models are sought after - RC-200 and 125 Duke," he said
Those involved in agriculture, meanwhile, said they are unable to find farm hands to work in their fields
"It is difficult to find a labourer
Youths have money, and no one wants to work in the fields," said Mohammad Junaid, who said he owns more than 30 acres of land in Luhinga
Kalan.Local support Investigators and experts said such large networks of cybercriminals thrive with support from locals, in part due to
lack of employment opportunities
In Nuh, like Jamtara, locals allowed use of their bank accounts to park and channel money scammed from frauds, police sources said.Kislay
Chaudhary, a cyber expert based in Delhi, said both in Jamtara and Nuh, scammers used the money they made to build houses, purchase
properties and invest in virtual currencies
"Similarly, they have purchased cars and sports bikes," he told TOI, adding money is also put into criminal enterprise-building
"A fraudster who is involved in SIM swapping will give his money to another fraudster who dupes people through loan applications
This is how the whole system runs," he said
Pavan Duggal, another Delhi-based cyber expert, said scammers also transfer money outside through hawala channels while investing in real
estate, gold and cryptocurrency
"They use cash to build houses, purchase cars and bikes and gold so that they can avoid transaction trials," he said.Eyes on the road Some
lanes with newly built houses have CCTV cameras mounted, but those aren't the only sets of eyes
A visitor, a new face in these parts, is closely watched
At Mahun, these correspondents in a car with a Gurgaon registration number were stopped by three youngsters - one of whom asked about the
destination while two others stood behind the car.Locals who declined to be named said the youths operate in a network that keeps an eye on
the entry and exit of vehicles from other areas (the two youngsters standing behind the car were likely taking down the cab's registration
Most residents, though, won't talk to outsiders unless there is another local who can vouch for the person.Chaudhary said cybercrime
networks employ locals as "guards"
"If you are going inside the villages with cops, then they will allow you to enter, but they will inform fraudsters about the police," he
said.How successful were the April raids?Some locals who agreed to talk said that many of the criminals had information about the assembling
police force in Gurgaon's Bhondsi before the raids this April
"The actual culprits had fled by the time the cops came
Around 20-25 people are absconding, while cops arrested six men from here," said a resident of Luhinga Kalan.The border nearby makes a
Bharatpur is a two-and-a-half-hour's drive from Luhinga Kalan and Mathura around two hours
A resident of Mahun pointed to hillocks near the border as the place where calls are made from
"Walk a few hundred metres further and you catch the network of Rajasthan
On this side, you have the cell network of Haryana," he said
Locals contest police's claim about the success of the April raid
"Every single person got to know about the raid in the village before it happened
And police arrested many people who weren't involved in cybercrimes," said Hasan Mohammad of Luhinga Kalan.Nuh police said they had done
their research before the raid
"We were preparing for one and a half months
Our teams had visited the villages to figure out how to reach the houses of the suspects too," the SP said, adding cybercrimes had seen a
decline since the raids too
