Odisha STF May Visit Bengal To Investigate OTP-Sharing Scam Mastermind’s Links With Guddu Kumar

Bhubaneswar: After interrogation of OTP-sharing scam accused Pritam Kar, the Odisha Special Task Force (STF) is likely to visit West Bengal to investigate the links between the alleged mastermind, Pathanisamant Lenka, and Guddu Kumar, arrested in December last year for passing on sensitive information, including photographs of certain strategic locations in north Bengal, to his handlers in Pakistan.

According to police sources, the West Bengal STF team, which recently interrogated Lenka and Pritam at Jharpada jail here, may also take the former on remand. Lenka went into hiding after Gudu’s arrest and Bengal police had also raided his house at Itamati in Nayagarh district. He also had links with a Patna-based woman, who was arrested by Rajasthan police recently for her alleged ties with some Pakistani agents.

At the end of two-day remand of Pritam, the Odisha police said that he admitted to having traded in cryptocurrency, amounting to Rs 1 crore. “The accused has revealed the names of some of his co-accused. Raids will be conducted to nab them,” said a senior STF official.

So far, seven persons have been arrested in Odisha for fraudulently procuring huge numbers of SIM cards and sharing one-time passwords (OTP) with Pakistani Intelligence Operatives (PIO) and ISI agents in Pakistan as well as in India,

While Pritam was arrested on on June 10, Lenka, also an ITI teacher, was nabbed last month along with Saroj Kumar Nayak and 19-year-old Soumya Pattnaik while another accused, Pradyumna Kumar Sahoo of Nayagarh, was arrested on June 7. Two associates of Lenka were also nabbed in May.