35 held for scamming cattle traders

Police have arrested 35 members of the gang for allegedly cheating cattle traders of lakhs of taka at the Aftabnagar temporary cattle market in Dhaka's Badda area.

Badda police station Officer-in-Charge (OC) Parvez Islam confirmed the matter to Dhaka Tribune and said that the fraudsters were arrested in a drive conducted from Thursday night till Friday 12pm.

During this period, police recovered one pick-up van, one private car, Tk1,25,000 and three packets of rubber bands used for rolling wads of cash, from their possession.

He said a group of fraudsters snatched a cow worth Tk 1,13,000 from a cattle dealer at Aftabnagar cattle market around 7pm on Thursday.

For a long time, this organized crime ring has been scamming simple cattle traders at various cattle markets in the country. Around 30-40 members work simultaneously.

Their modus operandi is to purchase a cow and place it in their van before payment. While paying in cash, they count their money in wads of thousands but replace them with other wads of bank notes which have a few thousands on the top and bottom of a wad of notes but are filled with 10s, 20s, and 50s in the middle. This way a cow worth a lakh taka is conned off from simple farmers by paying only Tk5,000-10,000.

By the time a poor trader is done counting and realizes about the scam, the gang of con artists have already fled off in their van.

The OC also said that they have admitted to the police that they bought and sold about eight cows from one market to another this way over the last two days.

Based on information, a vigilant team of Badda police station conducted a raid and arrested 35 members of the gang, he added.

Cases are being filed in this regard, he further added.