Six people, including the mastermind, have been arrested for defrauding the Waldo Casino in Chhaya Center using magnetic cards and contact lenses.
What you should know
The Kathmandu District Police Range has arrested a gang that was involved in organizing casino gaming events and defrauding people. It has been found that they were not only provided with transportation, food and accommodation in Kathmandu but also plane tickets. The Kathmandu Police Range gave this information at a press conference on Wednesday.
According to SP Pawan Bhattarai, spokesperson of the premises, they cheated by using cards with chips and putting 'eye lenses' on their eyes.
Those arrested are Suresh Maharjan, Dinesh Verma, Vikram Singh, Pramod Maurya, Chija Khadka and Bhavani Pandey. The casino operator, along with Neeraj Kumar alias Monu, Janardan Upreti alias Binod, Gaurav Khatri, Hirasekhar Malli Puri, Kamal Kharbanda Mukesh, are on the police's fugitive list, Bhattarai said.
Among them, Suresh Mahajan from India is the main planner. Police investigation has revealed that he organized this event in collaboration with Janardan Upreti alias Binod from Nepal. Mahajan, 57, is organizing events in Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Cambodia through the Mahakaya group.
Vinod alias Janardan Upreti had been running the event for 2 years. He coordinated the booking of tables at the casino and rooms at various hotels for this event. ‘People were brought from India by organizing the event from December 11 to 14 at Waldo Casino in Chhaya Center in Thamel, Kathmandu,’ Bhattarai said. ‘They brought the contact lenses and magnetic cards from Delhi.’
The cheating team had placed a player wearing the lenses and a dealer at each table. It was agreed that the casino operator would get 90 percent of the winnings and the players would get the remaining 10 percent. The police had recovered money, ATMs, magnetic cards, contact lenses and chemicals used in them, air tickets, passports and Indian cards from them.
SSP Ramesh Thapa said that the police have registered a case under Section 21 of the Criminal Code 2074 BS for fraud, criminal breach of trust and criminal gain (extortion) and Section 249 of the Penal Code for the offence of fraud.
