Surat: Woman dies during questioning in cyber fraud case

A Nasik Cyber Cell team comprising senior police inspector Shubhash Dhawale and two other officials had arrived in Surat on Sunday and took help from Amroli police and reached Meenaben’s house at Barodi Street in Chhaprabhata area. She was later told to show up at Amroli police station for questioning.

In the afternoon, Meenaben, accompanied by her son Ravi Rathod, reached the police station. During questioning, there was a power cut, after which the officials took her outside and sat in an open garden inside the campus. While the questioning was on, she allegedly found it difficult to breathe and could not answer questions and was scared. After her condition deteriorated, she was allowed to leave and was rushed to Surat Municipal Corporation-run SMIMER hospital where she was declared dead.

The grieving family has blamed the Nasik Cyber Cell officials for the tragedy. “My mother was facing breathing issues in the scorching heat. I requested Nasik (Cyber Cell) officials thrice to let her to go so that she be treated, but they continued questioning her. She was scared and was shivering. Her blood pressure dropped. The officials knew where we lived. I told them to allow her to come for the interrogation some other time, but they refused and I lost my mother,” Meenaben’s son Ravi told The Indian Express.

Meenaben lived with her husband Mahesh Rathod, son and daughter-in-law. Meenaben and her daughter-in-law worked as house helps. Mahesh is unemployed and ill, while Ravi, who met with an accident five months ago, was not working too, said Amroli police.

Nasik Cyber Cell’s Dhawale said, “We were probing a cyber fraud case registered around three months ago. There were many bank accounts used in the commission of the crime. We have arrested three persons so far and the investigation is still on. We found that some amount of money had been credited in Meenaben Rathod’s bank account, after which we reached Surat. During interrogation, Meenaben said she had shared her bank account details with some one else and allowed the person to use it.”

Amroli police inspector D K Patel said, “We have registered an accidental death report in Meenaben’s case. We will record statements of all the three officials of the Nasik Cyber Cell. We will decide our future course of action based on their statements.”