In 15 months, Gujarat Police recovered over Rs 147 crore lost to cyber fraud. Reporting within 8 hours the key, say officers

Indian Express

15-05-2025

In the last 15 months, the Gujarat Police has recovered over Rs 147 crore that were lost to cyber fraud cases. The figure is more than half of what was recovered between 2020 and 2024, officials told The Indian Express.
Most of the recovery was made in cases reported in the eight-hour window from the commission of the crime, they added.
Between January 1, 2024, and April 30, 2025, Gujarat police recovered a total of Rs 147.74 crore lost to cyber frauds, compared to Rs 218.16 crore recovered since 2020, largely because of an active helpline and co-ordination with banks, said officers.
To be sure, the total money lost by victims of cyber frauds in the January 2024-April 2025 period is Rs 1,761.73 crore as compared to Rs 2,941 crore lost in the three years since 2020, when digital activity picked up during the Covid-19 pandemic. This means that the recovery in the last 15 months is almost 8% of the amount lost than the nearly 7% recovered in the three years prior.
In 2024, the Gujarat police returned Rs 113.33 crore to victims while it has already managed to recover Rs 34.41 crore in the current year.
A sum of Rs 672.55 crore (since 2020) has been traced and currently 'frozen', awaiting court orders for returning to the victims.
On Wednesday, to expedite cyber crime refunds to citizens, Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel launched the statewide Cyber Crime Refund Portal, 'Tera Tujhko Arpan'. This would enable innocent citizens to use their bank accounts online without having to appear in person before the police in cases where accounts were reported to the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCCRP) for being used in a financial transaction in a cyber crime case.
Gujarat Cyber Crime Superintendent of Police Dharmendra Sharma says that the success rate of recovery of cyber crime money is high when cases are reported within eight hours. There is also a reasonably high probability of recovery until two days after the crime, he adds.
Sharma says, 'In Gujarat, we have a live case feature. If someone reports a cyber fraud within eight hours of being victimised, our success rate goes up 80%. Cyber crime is like a road accident, where you can save a person if you rush them in time for treatment. The success rate is higher in crimes where the person gets to know that he has been defrauded within two days. Cases of digital arrest take up to a week for the victim to realise as do investment frauds, where the victims are unaware for months at end…'
Sharma says that while digital arrests and investment frauds mostly originate from foreign countries, within India, Gujarat Police has traced most of the crime money to Rajasthan, Haryana, UP, West Bengal and Odisha. 'In India, Mewat region is one of the hotspots of cyber crime – this includes a few districts of Rajasthan, UP, and Haryana. But the accounts used for cyber frauds are also coming from many other states like Rajasthan, Odisha, West Bengal … Most of the money in frauds that originate outside India is ultimately settled in cryptocurrency. This mostly includes digital arrests and investment frauds,' he adds. 'Market frauds, identity and insurance frauds also have Indian origin and so, we can get the perpetrator and the recovery. Our recoveries include money from Indian-origin as well as foreign originated frauds because ultimately, so long as the money is in the bank chain, it can be recovered,' Sharma tells The Indian Express.
A dedicated call center of 150 personnel, including 60 police officers, attending to cyber crime victims in real-time, an almost foolproof money trail through liasoning with banks in freezing crime money, and 'relentless' awareness campaigns to urge residents to report victimisation — all this has ensured that the Gujarat police bettered its success rate of physical recovery of money lost in various cyber crime cases in the last six years, making it among the top three states in the country for cyber crime detection and recovery, said officers.
Among the cases detected is one of investment fraud, with over Rs 7 crore defrauded from victims, which is the highest loss from one source.
Sharma says that the Gujarat Police managed to recover over Rs 5 crore after arresting the main accused in the case. A second case involved a gang of seven persons, arrested for duping people in the garb of selling online games. Another fake marketing scam saw accused duping victims of more than Rs 3 crore. The Gujarat Cyber Crime have, so far, recovered Rs 30 lakh in the case.
The Gujarat Police recovered Rs 1.8 crore in an investment fraud case on arresting the accused. Sources said in one case of a fake website, the accused was arrested with Rs 8 lakh, which was almost the entire 'fraud amount' taken from a victim.
The Gujarat Police data shows that cyber crimes in marketplace frauds and identity frauds are higher in number, followed by investment frauds for stock markets and securities. The police also say that the success rate in recovering money is higher in case of marketplace frauds as they are also mostly originated within India. Sharma says, 'Marketplace and identity frauds, where people think they are speaking to someone genuine and make payments are common. People do realise that they have been victimised faster… Insurance frauds are also higher. When the victim is engaged for longer, like in digital arrests and stock market scams, it is easier to move the money out of the system, which is why cyber criminals are coming up with modus operandi to keep victims engaged for longer.'
According to the cyber crime chief, 'Recently, Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) [established by MHA] has onboarded the cryptocurrency exchanges on the portal so if it is converted into cryptocurrency, it can be frozen. But the issue here is that many crypto wallets are actually brought into the exchange of the cyber crime chain as they run as a 'trust wallet', on the principle of hawala money. If the money flows through the crypto exchange, it can be frozen…'
Regardless of the various forms of cyber crime modus operandis being used, the Gujarat police has improved its recovery ratio to 23% in 2025 — which is a minor increase from 22% recovery rate recorded from January to December 2024 but a significant move of over 50% since 2020. Says Sharma, 'There is a gradual increase. Even a percent of increase is significant in cyber fraud recoveries. In 2020, our recovery was about 11.5% and in 2021, it was around 13%. Now, we have a recovery of 23% in 2025. It is mainly because people know where to reach in case of a cyber crime as in Gujarat, we have taken a lot of efforts to create awareness about the cyber crime helpline number 1930.'
Some officers in the helpline team are connected to bank nodal officers who take things forward when anyone becomes a victim of cyber fraud. 'The time is important. The flow of money and withdrawals can be quick. We can actually go to the end of the chain,' says the cyber crime chief.
The helpline is manned by '90 outsourced people', which, Sharma claims, is the highest in the country. 'We have 150 personnel in total, which includes about 60 policemen. In many other states, there are about four or five people, which is not enough to attend to calls and follow up with banks. Now, several other states have visited Gujarat to see our 1930 set-up,' he adds.
According to him, the helpline is never busy because of the number of people manning it and victims get a call back immediately, and the complaint is processed in real time on the NCCRP. The victim gets an SMS when the money is traced and frozen.
What has made it easier is the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) directives to banks to form quick response teams. 'Time and again there are meetings between stakeholders to make responses quick… Earlier, banks did not have the mechanism or a response team for cyber frauds so they could not update but now, even banks have dedicated teams, regionally and centrally, and they willingly coordinate. Now, we are striving to increase the refund amount. Earlier, these matters were taken up in Lok Adalats. Now, it is done as a regular court hearing in almost all districts of the state. So, the amount that is going back to the victims is higher…,' he adds.