Digital marketing firm director arrested for duping investors in Odisha

Bhubaneswar: Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Odisha Crime Branch arrested Director of a digital marketing firm on charges of duping hundreds of investors in the State.

The arrested person has been identified as Prince Kumar, a resident of Muzaffarpur in Bihar. He is the Director of Digital Revolution Technologies Limited.

The accused was arrested from Brindaban in Uttar Pradesh on May 18 in connection with an EOW case under sections 406/420/467/468/471/120-B of IPC, 66 of IT Act, section 4/5/6 of Prize Chits & Money Circulation Scheme (Banning) Act, 1978 and section 6 of Odisha Protection of Interests of Depositors (in Financial Establishment) Act, 2011, EOW stated in a release today.

The accused was produced before the Court of CJM in Mathura and is being brought to Odisha, the EOW stated.

According to reports, Prince duped hundreds of investors across Odisha since 2020 alluring them of high returns under different schemes involving various digital/online products of his company.

Allegedly, the company issued forged documents and misappropriated the invested amount of around Rs 1.5 crore from investors in Odisha alone.

The duped amount may go up as the company has investors spread in many States including Maharashtra, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, West Bengal, Odisha and Chhattisgarh, the release stated.

The company was collecting huge amount from investors assuring them of high returns by running Indian version of WhatsApp, YouTube, Amazon, email, online/digital gaming, digital payment and Netflix under the names such as Shopsubkuch, MYPay, MyTube world, Vidscop, Chitthi and GoGame11.

The EOW stated that Prince Kumar, the Director of Digital Revolution Technologies Ltd. had held several meetings in Balasore and Bhadrak districts during the month of March in 2020. He had distributed brochures and made wide propaganda to convince the gullible investors that his company aims at strengthening the country through digital platforms and information technology.

He assured the investors that their deposit amounts will be double within a year.

“The deposit collected by the company under the cover of Direct Digital Marketing is nothing but Ponzi Scheme. The business model of M/s Digital Revolution Technologies Limited is a simple pyramid structure in which the early entrants earn money and as the number of investors/depositors increases, finding more investors to join becomes difficult or impossible and the scheme collapses at a point of time. Investors, those who joined late do not earn enough to cover their first outlay,” the EOW stated.