Rs 1K-Cr Crypto Scam: EOW Arrests Social Media Influencer Of STA In Odisha

Bhubaneswar: The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Odisha Crime Branch, which is investigating the alleged Rs 1,000 crore pan-India cryptocurrency fraud by a company called STA (Solar Techno Alliance) Token, has arrested one more person for his alleged involvement in the scam.

The arrested accused , identified as Ratnakar Palai (45), will be produced before the OPID Court, Cuttack, on Wednesday.

According to an EOW release, Palai is an important and up-line member of STA having huge number of members below him (known as down-line members in the MLM/ Pyramid based schemes/scams). “He is very close to Gurtej singh and Nirod Das. He is an MTech in IT from Karnataka University, Bangalore, and claims to be an international speaker, entrepreneur and investment guru. He is also propaganda head/ social media influencer of STA in Odisha. He used to run a YouTube channel for wider publicity of this scheme.”

The release further said that he is member of some other such dubious scams too which is under scrutiny. “He also runs an institute namely ‘Learn to Earn”. After the arrest of Gurtej and Nirod, he has, however, either deleted or deactivated his social media accounts.”

He had also visited Goa along with Nirod to participate in STA celebration, it added.

Gurtej Singh Sidhu and Nirod Das were arrested from Rajasthan and Bhadrak respectively on August 7.  They were also interrogated in EOW custody.

The EOW is said to have also learnt about the involvement of second foreigner, a Dutch national, in the scam. “While the firm is headed by one David Gez, a Hungarian national who visited India, including Odisha, multiple times to promote the illegal business, we have found the complicity of a citizen of The Netherlands in the fraud. We are trying to gather more details about him and his role,” EOW’s inspector general J N Pankaj told TOI.

The company ran an illegal pyramid-structured Ponzi business and collected around Rs 1,000 crore deposits from 2 lakh people across the country without having any authorisation from the Reserve Bank of India. Investors were lured on social media to invest in cryptocurrency and encouraged to enrol more investors under them. The company also offered an incentive to members to build the networks.