In a tragic incident in Agra, Uttar Pradesh, a woman died of a heart attack following an extortion call. The victim, Malti Verma, received a WhatsApp call from a man posing as a police officer on September 30, who claimed her daughter had been arrested in a sex trafficking case.
The caller threatened to leak an obscene video involving her daughter if a payment of Rs. 1 lakh was not made. The woman informed her son about the incident, asking him to immediately transfer the amount in order to save her daughter from being implicated in the case.
After listening to his mother's account, the victim's son, identified as Divyanshu, became suspicious and found that the call had been made by someone from Pakistan, who was posing as a police official to extort money from their family.
"After she got the call from the man, she panicked and called me, and I asked her for the number from which she had received the call. When I checked the number, I found that it had a +92 prefix and I told her it was a scam. She was still very anxious and started feeling unwell," Divyanshu said.
"I reassured her and also told her that I had spoken to my sister, who was in college and was fine," he added.
However, the incident took a massive toll on the woman's health. She started feeling unwell after returning from school around 4.00 pm. She was taken to a nearby hospital but was declared brought dead.
A video surfaced online, showing people rushing inside the victim's house to help her after she suffered a heart attack. The video further shows people carrying the woman to a car to take her to the hospital.
"I got a call from my brother who asked me where I was. He told me to give him a video call after I informed him that I was in college," the victim's daughter stated.
"The cause for this, her husband has said, was that she had received a call stating that her daughter had been caught in a sex racket and the caller had demanded Rs. 1 lakh from her. She got very worried because of this and died 15 minutes after she reached home. We are investigating the number from which the call came and will take action," a top police official said.
Sharing the news of the woman's death due to 'digital arrest', Congress said such cases have become very common in the country and need to be tackled.
"This is not the first incident of 'digital arrest' in the country. Such cases are coming to light every day. Cyber criminals are continuously harming people," Congress said.
