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Scamster or visionary?
On 2 February 2017, Anubhav Mittal, the 26-year-old owner of Social Trade, a 'digital marketing' web portal, was arrested by the Noida police for a virtual Ponzi scam, with Facebook likes being traded for quick money. Thousands of people have subsequently protested at Jantar Mantar against the 'wrongful arrest' of Mittal, who they believe to be a visionary.
Social Trade is a digital marketing web portal owned by Ablaze Pvt Limited. Speaking to The Quint, one of Social Trade’s users explained that the web portal sold ‘likes’ to companies, individuals and organisations who wanted to promote a webpage, FB page or a YouTube video.
Ashutosh is an IT business analyst who lives in Delhi. He invested Rs 57,500 and was promised 6,000 likes on his wife’s Facebook page over the course of one year. What’s the best part according to him?
He could earn back the money by clicking on 125 links every day. He was paid Rs 625 (Rs 5 for a like) and after a tax deduction, around Rs 475 was deposited in his account everyday. All Social Trade payments were made through a NEFT transaction, say users.
To create a Social Trade account, a user had to pay a sign-up amount, submit KYC documents and bank account details for payment. Sharma signed up on Social Trade with 0 likes on his wife’s Facebook page, and now has 1,800 ‘e-points’ (or ‘likes’).
But not all Social Trade users had a page or business to promote. So, they either shared their personal Facebook page or trusted their friends to put in a link while registering.
Ramesh S is from Tamil Nadu, but now lives in Bangalore. He heard about Social Trade from his friend and made 5 accounts with the site, investing Rs 3,00,000. He registered with three accounts in December, and two in January, he tells The Quint.
Out of six Social Trade investors The Quint spoke to, four confessed to logging in without a link or just copy-pasting their Facebook profile.
Ramesh S clicked 250 links a day, since he got a ‘booster’. A ‘booster’ was an incentive given to Social Trade users if they recruited two more users. More links to click would mean more money every day.
So, what’s 3W Digital? And where does Frenzz Up come in?
According to Social Trade users, Ablaze Pvt Ltd was in a flux in 2016-end. They were changing their business model in accordance with the new regulations brought in by Ministry of Consumer Affairs. While it is difficult to corroborate this reasoning, it would be remiss to mention that on 9 September 2016, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs released new guidelines on Direct Selling and Multi-level Marketing.
Users were informed that their accounts and ‘e points’ would be migrated to Frenzz Up, which is ostensibly where the delay in payments comes in. Until then, all six Social Trade users The Quint spoke to, said their payments were regular.
Jagdish* (name changed), an IT executive in Delhi, has 3 accounts with Social Trade and invested Rs 1,72,000. He says,
Dinesh is unhappy with Social Trade because he wasn’t informed that he would get Rs 42 per day. Clicking 10 links a day, he was under the impression he’d be paid Rs 50. He invested Rs 5,750 in Social Trade and posted a complaint on ‘Jaago Grahak Jaago’ complaint portal on 19 December 2016.
Social Trade owner, Anubhav Mittal was arrested after two complaints were registered at Noida’s Surajpur and Phase-3 police stations, for not paying them for their investment.
When The Quint spoke to Social Trade users, the longest non-payment period was 45 days. Interestingly though, two of the users said that the company had notified them about non-payment for two weeks since they were ‘changing the business model’.
On Facebook, there are several ‘Support Anubhav Mittal’ pages. Videos and posts on these pages galvanised into the crowd of people seen in Jantar Mantar; who fiercely believe that Mittal is a visionary who is being unfairly targeted.
Social Trade users told The Quint how they thought of Mittal was a true Indian innovator and how Intmart and Frenzz Up were made as Indian answers to Amazon and Facebook respectively. Those who have complained against Social Trade on ‘Jago Grahak Jago’ are either panicked customers who want a refund or are complaining about delay in payments.
But there are several questions which still remain, out of which, two are the most prominent:
1. It was reported that links on Social Trade were directed to a fake server. This is an aspect of the story which still remains unclear.
2. What is the specific charge of money laundering being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate?
And what do Social Trade users plan on doing until the truth about the ‘scam’ emerges?
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)