A 23-year-old man in Delhi is accused of posing as a wealthy businessman on Instagram to win the trust of women police constables, and then taking Rs 24 lakh from them. Moneycontrol reports that he allegedly targeted nearly 20 women constables from the same batch.
Police are now going through the financial transactions and looking at possible links to a betting app. The man already has five FIRs against him, which suggests this was not his first brush with the law. Moneycontrol did not report how the money was collected or whether he is in custody, and those details remain unclear.
An old trick, a new platform
The method is a very old one. A confidence trick works by gaining a person’s trust first and then exploiting it, and the tools it leans on are familiar: credulity, vanity, confidence and greed. The wealthy-businessman persona fits neatly. It costs a few photographs and a profile, and it gives the target a reason to believe.
The term itself dates to the 1840s. William Thompson, a clumsy swindler, simply asked strangers to show confidence in him by handing over money or a watch. After his arrest in July 1849, James Houston of the New York Herald dubbed him the “Confidence Man” in a satirical piece that readers took at face value. The National Police Gazette coined “confidence game” a few weeks later. Thompson was a poor scammer, but the coverage made him famous.
The Delhi allegations are a reminder that the trade has moved from the street to the direct message, and that police officers are as exposed to it as anyone. The five existing FIRs suggest investigators will have plenty of earlier complaints to examine.
Sources
- Rich businessman on Instagram, fraud in reality: Delhi man dupes 20 women police constables of Rs 24 lakh- Moneycontrol.com
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Photo: DiplomatTesterMan (CC BY-SA 4.0)
