Sri Lankan held in Bengaluru is Tamil Nadu’s most-wanted bank card fraudster

Sri Lankan national Divyan alias Dinesh alias Pulikesi, 30, who landed in Bengaluru police custody on Friday, happens to be Tamil Nadu’s most-wanted bank card fraudster who had been on the run for five years. 

The then TN governor had issued an exclusive detention order in 2012 to nab the foreign national, suspected to have swindled over Rs 100 crore.

Apparently, his blunder of revealing his original cellphone number after purchasing a TV set using a cloned card brought Bengaluru cops to his doorstep in Jalahalli.

Along with Divyan, his accomplices Nawaz Shariff, 22, and Nadeem Shariff, 30, were taken into custody by a Central Crime Branch (CCB) team; 270 dummy creditdebit cards, 114 cloned cards, 36 EDC machines and other equipment used for the fraud were found at his apartment which was taken for a monthly rent of Rs 50,000.

Fled to Bengaluru in 2012:

Booked in Chennai alone and TN police declaring him as a notorious fraud, Divyan fled the state in November 2012, the same evening the governor issued an order to detain him in the camp for notorious foreign suspects. 

“Divyan came to Bengaluru in 2012 and was operating a big racket. Apart from Nawaz and Nadeem, we suspect 10 more are involved. We also suspect Shorty’s hand,” said an investigating officer with Bengaluru CCB. 

In Chennai police said Divyan, a native of Jaffna, came to the city in mid-2007 and teamed up with fraudster and Sri Lankan national Umesh alias Shorty.

“Shorty was his guru in the trade and they were involved in nearly 2,000 offences in the state where they had siphoned off over Rs 2 crore,” said a CCB official in Chennai. 

Source: Time of India 

-Agencies