Azamgarh Cyber Crime Police arrested a cunning thug who swindled lakhs of rupees by posing as an IAS officer:

News Topical, Digital Desk : Cyber Crime Police of Azamgarh district has arrested a cunning thug who used to cheat village heads by introducing himself as an officer of Information Commission. Accused Pankaj Yadav has cheated village heads of lakhs of rupees so far by introducing himself as Harshvardhan Singh Rathore IAS, an officer of Raj Bhavan Secretariat. Police have recovered two mobile phones and Rs 3,200 in cash from him. Superintendent of Police (Rural) Chirag Jain said that this action was taken on July 13. A case was already registered against the accused in Cyber Police Station Azamgarh, in which he was being searched.

During police interrogation, accused Pankaj Yadav told that he used to collect information of village heads and former heads from NIC's website. After this, he used to call the heads by introducing himself as an officer of Information Commission or Raj Bhavan Secretariat and used to extort money from them by threatening to investigate corruption complaints against them. In the name of fake investigation of government tax or funds, he used to mislead the heads and get the money transferred to the accounts mentioned by him.

Last year he cheated the village head's husband.
In the year 2024, he cheated the village head's husband Mohammad Arif of Gocha village in Azamgarh district in the same way. By claiming to be the secretary of the Raj Bhavan, he cheated Arif of a total of Rs 8 lakh 26 thousand 995. This chain of cheating was spread across many districts.

Accused Pankaj Yadav was changing
his hideouts to avoid arrest and even spread the false news of his death. He made fake death pictures and sent them to his family and acquaintances as well as the police. But the police caught him from Chitrakoot district on the basis of technical surveillance and accurate location. The arrested accused Pankaj Yadav is a resident of Nathupur Surajpur Ramsanehi Ghat of Asandra police station area of Barabanki district.

The police officer said that information is being gathered about how many village heads and former heads have been taken money in this manner in other districts and if cases are registered against him in other districts, action will be taken in those cases too.