Overview

• An FIR filed on September 6 details how an impostor posed as an IIT Bombay professor and lured the university with supposed DST and DRDO-linked projects.
• The fraud began after a message sent in the name of a former SPPU vice-chancellor introduced the alleged professor and shared a contact number and forged emails.
• Three transfers were made as two-percent "eligibility" fees: Rs 56 lakh on July 25, Rs 46 lakh around July 30, and Rs 1.44 crore on August 7.
• The scheme unraveled when the visitor failed to show for a late-August campus meeting to sign MoUs, prompting a call to IIT Bombay that confirmed the claims were false.
• Pune cyber police say they are tracing contact details and mule bank accounts used in the transactions, as the university says its SOPs were bypassed by highly convincing documentation.