VARANASI: Sleuths of the cybercrime cell have nabbed one Vivek Kumar of Mirzapur, the driver of former BJP MLA Surendra Narain Singh, for making payment of about Rs 30 lakh from the latter’s account for online shopping of electronics, household goods, clothes, and food items between 2019 and 2021.
Singh became MLA from the Rohania constituency in 2017 on Bharatiya Janata Party ticket but he did not contest in 2022 elections as BJP had left the seat for alliance partner Apna Dal (Sonelal).
IG Range K Satyanarain, on Saturday, said, “After registering a case on the complaint of former MLA Surendra Narain Singh, the cybercrime cell of Varanasi range conducted a detailed investigation and then arrested Vivek from Karsada area on Friday. The cybercrime cops recovered two smart TVs, electrical equipment for DJ, including amplifiers, sound mixing machines, stabilizers, lights, laptop, cooler, inverter, battery and many more items worth over Rs 8 lakh.”
During interrogation, Vivek revealed that he worked as watchman of Chunar police station in Mirzapur and was hired as driver of the MLA on a monthly salary of Rs 9,000 in February 2018. While working for the MLA, Vivek won the confidence and became like a family member. As Singh started showing faith in his driver, he shared with him the details of his bank account in which he received salary of MLA, and his mobile phones.
Vivek said he looked after the payments of mobile and medicines by using the MLA’s debit cards.
In 2019, he downloaded the Amazon and Flipkart apps, and started buying goods for himself by using the MLA’s debit card since he also had the mobile phones on which the OTPs were sent, said cybercrime cell officials.
He used his own address to receive delivery of the online purchases.
During investigation, the cops found that many costly items like 138 cm smart TV worth Rs 5.80 lakh, machines, and electronic items for DJ were bought apart from branded shoes, garments, and food items.
Till 2021, Vivek spent around Rs 30 lakh from the MLA’s bank account on his online purchases, said officials adding that they had to work hard in collecting details of the items that had been purchased online.
