Two arrested in Hyderabad for running illegal online sand booking racket

By Newsmeter Network  Published on  15 July 2020 1:22 PM GMT
Two arrested in Hyderabad for running illegal online sand booking racket

Hyderabad: The Rachakonda police arrested two people at Boduppal here on 15 July for illegal sand booking through the Telangana government's portal Sand Sales Management and Monitoring System (SSMMS) portal. Sisodiya Adesh Jain and Sisodiya Arihanth Jain were using autofill software to book sand for needy customers and collecting huge sums of money as commission.

To prevent illegal transportation of sand, the government of Telangana has started online booking for sand through SSMMS. The online portal is open only for 15 minutes every day, i.e. from noon to 12:15 p.m. People have to book sand within this limited time period and only 500 bookings are approved. If anyone fails to make the payment within the allotted time, the booking is automatically cancelled.

The rising demand for sand means that several customers are booking sand daily within the prescribed 15 minutes. This jams the portal. The two brothers, Adesh and Arihanth, saw a business opportunity here and started booking sand for customers by accepting a commission of Rs. 500-2,000 depending on the demand.

The two men had observed that a booking slot stayed open only for five to seven minutes. They purchased an auto-fill software and started booking sand on behalf of customers. The duo earned over Rs. 1,400-1,600 for each vehicle. They also maintained Benami accounts to handle the money.

Their illegal activity was inconveniencing genuine customers who were unable to book sand for many days. Further, customers were left with no alternative except to approach such miscreants if they wanted sand.

The sleuths of the special operations team along with the cybercrime police accused the two men on Wednesday. They also seized five laptops and three mobile phones from their possession.

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