Woman Allegedly Duped People of Rs 30 Crore; Caught near Chambal

Vishalakshi Bhat has allegedly duped people of Rs 30 crore and gone missing for many months. (Photo: iStockphoto)

A Bengaluru woman, who was working as a manager in an HDFC Life insurance firm in the city and had gone missing for over a month after she allegedly duped several people of Rs 30 crore, was nabbed by the city police recently from near Chambal in Uttar Pradesh, The Times of India reported.

Forty-one-year-old Vishalakshi Bhat was brought to the city from Etawah on Thursday by the South Bengaluru police and produced before a local court. She has been sent to five days’ police custody.

It was in November, when some of the victims complained to the police, that the scam came to light.

Vishalakshi, a manager with HDFC Life insurance firm’s BTM Layout branch, allegedly took money from people, including many of her relatives, stating that she had to pay premium and deposits. Police initially had some difficulty tracking her as she had discarded her mobile phone and SIM card before she fled. However, she sent two emails, one to her husband on November 30 and other to relatives on December 4, which helped the cops track her, the report states.

In one of her emails, Vishalakshi pleaded her husband to stop looking for her, but the husband contacted the police.

The TOI report further states, “Alerted by the husband, police began tracing the origin of the email. Police efforts were slowed down by the floods in Chennai but after a few days they zeroed in on the location in Etawah district of Uttar Pradesh. A police team with the husband immediately headed to the spot, which turned out to be a forested cliff.That’s when police too began veering around to a conclusion that Vishalakshi could be dead. However, police decided to stretch their search and enquiries revealed that a woman matching Vishalakshi’s description was living about 100km from that spot. Srikant was taken to the spot to check if the woman was his wife. The mission ended with Vishalakshi landing in cops’ custody on Wednesday, sources said.”

An official told the TOI, “We are yet to question Bhat on what she did with the crores of rupees she received from friends, relatives, businessmen and others. As of now, we don’t see any documents or materials to show that Vishalakshi has invested the money in different schemes as she promised.”