Delhi journalist loses Rs 40,000 after being 'hypnotised' over the phone

The freelance journalist also said that he felt like he was losing his reasoning power while speaking with the caller and started to follow his instructions. (Representational Photo).

A Delhi-based freelance journalist was cheated of Rs 40,000 after he claimed that a person "hypnotised" him over the phone. The man, who was identified as 40-year-old Ramesh Kumar Raja, said that the person on the call claimed he knew Raja and over two UPI transactions, took Rs 20,000 from him.

Raja added that he and the caller spoke on several different topics such as health and family and admitted that the person on the other side sounded so confident that it never caused him any doubt.

"The caller pretended to be known to me and during the telephone conversation, he hypnotised me (diverted my mind and thought process) to get fraudulent transactions of Rs 40,000 in two phases of Rs 20,000 each from my bank account via Paytm UPI," Raja told PTI.

"Since his voice resembled that of a friend of mine who is a doctor, I asked him if he was the one and he said, 'Yes, now you have recognised me correctly'," Raja added.

The freelance journalist also said that he felt like he was losing his reasoning power while speaking with the caller and started to follow his instructions. Following yet another conversation, the person told Raja that he had to pay money to someone, but his online payments app was not working.

He then told Raja that he wished to deposit some money into his account and said he would collect it later from him in the evening.

The person on the call initiated the transaction by sending Raja Rs 2. He then sent him a message on Paytm and Raja opened the message after entering a PIN number.

However, he realised that Rs 2 had been deducted his bank account, that was linked to Paytm.

"Though it was a strange offer, I still couldn't question him and say why he himself cannot withdraw money from any nearby ATM," Raja said.

"I told him that instead of getting money, I lost Rs 2. Then he apologised and said that it happened by mistake and sent another message on which I clicked and entered my pin. This time I received Rs 4," he added.

The person then sent Raja another message over Paytm stating he was sending him Rs 20,000, but when Raja initiated the process, he found out that he had lost Rs 20,000 from his account.

When Raja informed him about the deduction, he apologised and sent him another message, clicking on which Raja lost Rs 20,000 again from his account.

Raja informed the caller about the two deductions, but he gave some excuse and disconnected the call. Raja then filed a case with the Delhi Police on April 25 and gave them details of the crime that was committed on March 7.

As per cyber experts, this type of crime is a new way of exploiting the positivity and friendly nature of other people.

Despite the complaint, a police officer said that it had become "a most normal kind of cyber fraud".

However, a police officer dismissed Raja's claim. "This is a most normal kind of cyber fraud. I have been receiving many such cases in which people get calls where the strangers first ask them to recognise and then dupe them after a friendly chat," the officer said.

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