Those arrested are Raju Panthi, a Nepali national, and Bangladeshi nationals Mojam Mohamed, Mohamed Saleh Ahamed and Mohamed Sorabujaman. Around 500 Nepal Telecom SIM cards and 2,500 Ncell SIM cards were recovered from them during different raids at Lazimpat, Tusal and Jorpati where the racketeers had installed their call by-passing devices. [break]
Bangladeshi racketeers are heavily involved in telephone call by-passing that is estimated to have been bleeding telecom service providers in Nepal to the tune of hundreds of millions, officials said.
Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Rajendra Singh Bhandari, chief of CIB, said that police have so far been able to only bust the company employees involved but not the masterminds. “We have reliable information about the operators and are working hard to arrest them. As of the lynchpins, we have yet to verify our information,” he added.
According to DIG Singh, Bangladeshi racketeers had made their way to Nepal after their networks in Bangladesh were almost destroyed three years ago. He said that VOIP racketeering has challenged the state´s efforts at curbing organized crime. “In major cases like the murder of Jamim Shah and kidnapping of Dr Bhaktaman, by-passed telehpone calls were used,” he said.
Singh insisted that the problem is difficult to solve without involving police in the verification process before distributing SIM cards. Singh, meanwhile, claimed that continuous efforts made by Nepal Police have been a tremendous blow to VOIP racketeers.
According to CIB, there are only 10 call by-pass points yet to be raided in the capital and more than 150 points have been destroyed over the past three years. Among 32 persons arrested in anti-VOIP operations, nine are Bangladeshi nationals.
Nepal Telecom (NT) spokesman Surendra Thike said that NT witnessed a monthly revenue increase of up to Rs 300 million following busting of most of the VOIP rackets.
According to Thike, NT has so far blocked around 200,000 SIM cards used in call by-passing. Ncell blocked 100,000 SIM cards. Ncell spokesman Sanju Koirala said that the company has suspended 13 SIM-card distributors for issuing SIM cards in an unauthorized manner. “We are in the process of verification and amending our system,” she added.
VOIP racketeers have been found to have mostly used Ncell SIM cards. United Telecom Limited (UTL) and STM Company failed to appear at the press briefing organized by CIB on Monday.
Officials say Internet Service Providers (ISP) are aware of VOIP racketeers but have not been willing to cooperate with the authorities.
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