‘Please take me to Maha jail, but ensure pay parity of ₹620’: Kerala teacher stumps cyber scammers

Kochi: At a time when the revised daily wages for prisoners have sparked heated debates about the "lucrative" nature of jail time in Kerala, a Kochi teacher decided to bring that very debate to a gang of cyber fraudsters. The result? A foiled "digital arrest" scam and a baffled "Anti-Terrorist Squad" officer who couldn't figure out why his victim was negotiating salary packages for prison life.

Venkatesh Gopinath, a teacher at the TD Teachers' Training Institute in Mattancherry, turned the tables on a gang of scammers by asking a simple, unexpected question: "If I surrender to the Maharashtra police, will I get the same ₹620 daily wage that prisoners earn in Kerala?”

The drama began on Wednesday afternoon with a classic "Digital Arrest" setup, which gets reported in the news very often. Gopinath received a call with an automated voice claiming to be from the Mumbai Police Headquarters. The voice warned him that he was wanted for a crime and transferred the call to an "officer".

"I was aware of these cyber frauds from the news, so I didn't panic," Gopinath told Onmanorama. "But since I was curious to see their modus operandi, I didn't hang up. When the 'police officer' asked where I was working, I played along and told him I was currently jobless. He then claimed a terrorist captured in Kashmir had my contact details, and I was now answerable to the Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS), Mumbai," Gopinath said.

The scam escalated to a WhatsApp video call, where a man in a police uniform appeared against a staged backdrop of a police station. He displayed a fake charge sheet and grimly narrated the details of the "terrorist link".

However, the fraudsters had picked the wrong target. Gopinath, who had served as an Associate NCC Officer for the National Cadet Corps (NCC) and a Community Police Officer for the Student Police Cadets (SPC), was aware of how police work.

"I am very familiar with police uniforms and protocol. The man in the video call hadn't shaved, which is uncharacteristic for an officer on duty. More importantly, he was wearing the emblem on his police cap incorrectly. I noticed these red flags immediately and confirmed it was a scam. But I decided to act convinced and tense," Gopinath said.

Feigning fear, Gopinath listened as the scammer threatened him with immediate arrest and imprisonment in Maharashtra. Seizing the moment, Gopinath dropped his punchline. "I asked him, 'In Kerala, prisoners receive ₹620 as daily wages. If I come to the Maharashtra jail, will I get the same amount? If so, I am ready to go to jail'," Gopinath recalled.

The question left the scammer completely baffled. Unaware that the high wages for skilled prisoners in Kerala were a topic of headlines, the fraudster asked Gopinath if he was a prison staff member. "I told him no. He then asked, 'If you aren't staff, how would you get a salary from jail?' He clearly had no idea about the wages paid to prisoners. I casually used the topic to taunt him," Gopinath said.

Flustered and unable to regain control of the script, the scammer mumbled that he would call back later and instructed Gopinath to go to a secluded place and be ready. But he never called back.

Gopinath immediately reported the incident to Kochi Cyber Police, who later appreciated his “quick and prudent decision in recognising and resisting the fraud” through an official email. However, Gopinath has a word of caution for the general public.

"I stayed on the line because I was confident, but the police advised me that it can be dangerous to engage with fraudsters for too long. There are risks of phone hacking or data theft. Ideally, one should cut the call and report it to the police immediately. A normal person might fall for the convincing appearance of these scammers, so awareness is the only defence against these fraudsters," Gopinath said.