Pune Cyber Police Arrest Engineer in ₹2.46 Crore University Scam

Pune cyber police have arrested 34-year-old electronics and telecommunications engineer Seetaiah Kilaru, who holds a PhD from a UK university, in connection with an online fraud involving a private Pune university that lost Rs 2.46 crore to a scammer posing as an IIT Bombay professor.

Kilaru was arrested on September 21 in Hyderabad and brought to Pune, he has been remanded to police custody until September 28. The authorities seized debit cards, passbooks, cheque books, laptops, mobile phones, two cars, and gold purchase receipts as proceeds of the crime.

According to The Indian Express, Kilaru, a resident of Yapral in Hyderabad, Telangana, was a UPSC aspirant who cleared the preliminary exam twice and also taught at a UPSC training academy. Investigations revealed that he had been previously booked and arrested in 2023 for online fraud and impersonation.

India Today has reported that scam took place between July 25 and August 7, when the university’s top management was misled into believing they could access government-funded research grants, including projects with DRDO on AI and drones.

The scam involves three transactions over a few weeks: on July 25, the university transferred ₹56 lakh to secure project eligibility; on July 30, ₹46 lakh was sent for a supposed AI project; and on August 7, ₹1.44 crore was paid for a claimed machine learning project.

The fraudster had promised to sign the MoU on August 28, but the meeting never took place. The chief education officer then contacted the real IIT professor, who denied any involvement, and the university filed the case on September 6.

On September 10, the private university told TOI: "This was an unusual case of impersonation, with documents and communications made to appear authentic. Once the fraud was detected internally, the transfers were halted, and a cybercrime complaint was filed immediately."