The Bheemunipatnam police have arrested managing director of Career Step Resources Limited, a New Delhi-based job consultancy firm, for alleged online job fraud.

A team of one sub-inspector and two constables went to the capital city and arrested Rajneesh Kumar, after the scam had surfaced in April this year, when a youth from Bheemunipatnam was cheated. According to the SHO of Bheemunipatnam police station Appalanaidu, the accused was luring gullible job aspirants through online advertisement or directly contacting the candidates by e-mail. The entire process was being done through Internet, said Mr. Appalanaidu. “He even went to the extent of designing logos of top MNCs and would send job offers and other correspondence to gain the confidence of aspirants. He would even host an online interview. Thereafter, he would charge processing fees and even ask for one month salary in advance, which could range from Rs. 80,000 to 2 lakh, as commission,” the SHO told The Hindu . The fraud had come to light in April, when one Pravin from Bheemunipatnam had got suspicious and browsed the Net to check the authenticity of the job offer letter sent to him. He was given an offer letter from Forever 21, an MNC merchandising firm, in Dubai. On checking he found out that the entire thing was a fraud and he lodged a complaint in the police station on April 10.

Mr. Rajneesh was brought from Delhi on transit remand and the investigation was on. “We are yet to ascertain how many people he had duped,” said the SHO.