Two employees of Paytm Payments Bank Company have been arrested for allegedly releasing nearly ₹30 lakh from accounts that had been frozen by law enforcement agencies in connection with cyber scams. The incident occurred in Noida, and the arrests were made on Tuesday.

According to police reports, the two accused individuals, Chandresh Rathore from Jabalpur in Madhya Pradesh and Tariq Anwar from Mau in Uttar Pradesh, worked as customer executives at Paytm. They allegedly misused their access to defreeze accounts that were under scrutiny by the authorities, thereby facilitating the fraudulent release of funds.

The investigation into the matter began about 10 months prior, on August 30, 2024, when Paytm, headquartered in Noida, filed a complaint with the Cyber Crime police. The company reported that some of its employees were defreezing accounts without obtaining proper authorization from law enforcement officials or the courts.

The police investigation revealed that Rathore and Anwar had fraudulently released ₹29.9 lakh by defreezing accounts that were under court scanner. Additional DCP (cyber) Shavya Goyal stated that the two customer executives were subsequently arrested on Tuesday.

Authorities suspect that the accused were acting on behalf of an intermediary who was in contact with the owners of the frozen accounts, who were possibly individuals under investigation in various cyber fraud cases. These account owners allegedly paid the accused to defreeze their accounts and release the funds. ACP (cyber) Vivek Ranjan Rai noted that the accused had been assisting cyber criminals in this manner for several years before their apprehension. He added that they were arrested under relevant sections of the BNS ( Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita).

Another officer involved in the investigation indicated that more employees of the company might be implicated in the scam. Preliminary investigations suggest that an employee from Paytm's Hyderabad team is the kingpin of this network. The police are currently working to locate and apprehend this individual. According to the officer, the accused had customer access to the frozen accounts.

Following their arrest, the two men were presented before a local court on Tuesday. The investigation is ongoing to uncover the full extent of the fraudulent activities and identify any other individuals involved.