Customer alleges telecom major threatened him, forced him to pay an inflated bill
Customer alleges telecom major threatened him, forced him to pay an inflated bill
A fake cop threatening arrest under a non-bailable warrant and a fake lawyer to check case details with.
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Recovery agents have become smarteru00a0 and a media professional's wife residing at Malviya Nagar in south Delhi learnt this the hard way.
According to Prasoon Srivastava, the media professional, his wife was at home when she received a call on her mobile phone at around 1 in the afternoon from a number, 32096070. The caller, who identified himself as Devendra Bhasin, a cop, said he would come to their house at 5 pm as a non-bailable warrant had been issued against Srivastava.
"The caller told my wife since I had not paid my telephone bills I would be arrested at 5 in the evening. He told her that the order to arrest me had come from the deputy police commissioner of the district. He did not give her details of the case. He directed my wife to speak to a lawyer and gave her my case file number," said Srivastava.
Srivastava said he even called the lawyer, identified at Anil Yadav, at the phone number 9015787664.
Srivastava said the man who called his wife said the case had been filed by Tata Indicom and a court had issued the warrant with the case number 125/09. "I am surprised how these people got the number used by my wife. Tata Indicom has my wife's mobile number but how can they reveal private numbers to others, even a cop? This is a violation of privacy."
Trouble starts
Srivastava said his problems with Tata Indicom started when he refused to pay an inflated bill.u00a0
"I was never happy with the services provided by the company. I reminded authorities about the problems and stopped using the phone. Yet I got an inflated bill of Rs 7,205. On July 27 I lodged a complaint at the Consumer Online Resource and Empowerment Centre (1408/4/2009). Yet I paid the bill on Friday after learning that a non-bailable warrant was issued against me. They threatened me to recover the money against the fake bill," said Prasoon.
Cop, no cop
Srivastava was even more surprised when he cross-checked and learnt there was no police official at the Mandawli police station by the name of Devendra Bhasin.u00a0 When MiD DAY called up the Mandawli police station on Friday, the duty officer confirmed there was no one by that name and that they had received at least 15 phone calls during the day from various people asking for Bhasin.
"I have filed a complaint at the Malviya Nagar police station. The caller posing as a police official and another as a lawyer have resorted to extortion. I hope the police will arrest the guilty as soon as possible," added Srivastava. Talking to MiD DAY, a senior police official said, "If someone has posed as a police official and indulged in extortion then suitable action will be taken." MiD DAY tried to contact Devendra Bhasin and Anil Yadav at the telephone numbers provided by them but both phones were switched off.
The Other Side
"Since we have not been approached by any investigating official on the matter so far, we would not be able to comment. Having said so, we would like to clarify that we don't have any such practice and request you to provide us the details of the person involved so that we could look into the matter and take action accordingly," said a spokesperson from Tata Teleservices Limited.
What RBI says
Laying down tough guidelines for banks on recovery agents, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) threatened erring banks with a ban on engaging recovery agents in a particular area, either jurisdictional or functional, for a limited period.
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