Mangaluru: Chandrashekar, a resident of Moodabidri in Karkala taluk, who had been detained in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for the past 11 months on charges of falling victim to the hacking of a bank account, has finally been released. He arrived back to India on Monday (November 20).
According to the police there, Chandrashekar was sent to Mumbai by plane, and from there, he reached Mangaluru airport in the evening. Working in Bangalore, Chandrashekar had risen to a higher position in 2022 and had taken up employment in a company in Saudi Arabia. He worked at a company called Alpanar Ceramics there. In November 2022, he had visited Riyadh to purchase mobiles and SIMs. He had provided accurate identity information twice for the application.
A week later, Chandrashekar received a phone call in Arabic from a new number, seeking information about the SIM. Two days later, another call came, requesting details about the SIM. Unaware that hackers had opened an account in their name at a bank, Chandrashekar provided the details. The hackers transferred 22,000 riyals from a woman’s account in the same bank to his account, and the money was then diverted to another country. The woman noticed the missing money and alerted the police.
Despite being detained, he attempted to provide the bank with information about the theft. Friends had collected Rs 10 lakh and handed it over to lawyers, but his release did not materialize. Shobha Karandlaje, the Union Minister for Foreign Affairs, brought it to the Ministry of External Affairs’ attention, but it proved ineffective, according to Sridhar Gowda. Since November 18, representatives and organizations from South Kanara district had been trying to bring it to the attention of the Prime Minister and the Ministry of External Affairs through a letter campaign. Finally, the company in Riyadh expedited Chandrashekar’s release after learning about the media coverage.
