Yet another illegal internet-based ISD racket busted in Pune

The Pune Police has busted yet another Internet telephony racket in the city. The city police last month had busted a racket run by Mactel Ltd, which bypassed the official international subscriber dialing (ISD) service of Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd (VSNL) by offering illegal internet-based telephony.

Acting on a tip-off that a similar racket was being run in a different part of the city, the city crime branch kept the offices of Sach Infotech Telemarketing under surveillance. The overseas call service, allegedly run by Sunil Subramanyam, was raided on Tuesday and a rich haul of sophisticated equipment was unearthed. The police however, could not get their hands on Subramanyam who had vanished from his residence after the Mactel racket was busted. The girls employed by him pleaded ignorance about the Internet telephony operation.

Subramanyam, a resident of Bangalore and a marine engineer by training, had set up the exchange in May this year by hiring bandwidth from Satyam Infoway, erecting a tower and antennae at his office, taking 25 land lines from BSNL and 30 lines from Hughes.

"Subramanyam had made arrangements with companies in US and Canada for Internet telephony. The end-receiver here had no idea that his call was bypassing VSNL," Dilip Shinde, Inspector, Crime branch said.

According to the landline bills run by Sach Infotech, nearly 1 lakh calls have been made from the office, which may constitute an estimated loss of Rs 15 lakh in terms of VSNL's international subscriber dialing

(ISD) revenue.

No arrests have been made in this connection. A police team, which went to Bangalore returned empty handed. The police have booked Subramanyam under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code, Indian Telegraphic Act and Indian Wireless Telegraphic Act.