The cyber financial fraud helpline in Mumbai has emerged as a crucial defense against scams, successfully blocking Rs 162 crore in the past few months and accumulating savings of Rs 552 crore since its launch in 2022. One case involved an accountant who fell for a fake message, resulting in a blocked Rs 1 crore transfer. Meanwhile, a scammer’s impersonation led an employee to lose Rs 5.

MUMBAI: Last week, an accountant at a private company received a WhatsApp message appearing to be from a senior colleague, directing him to urgently transfer Rs 1 crore of company funds. The message included bank account details, and the accountant, believing it to be genuine, completed the transfer.It was only during routine verification calls that he discovered the colleague had sent no such message. The company’s management immediately contacted the national cyber financial fraud helpline, 1930The trained team blocked the entire amount before the scammers could withdraw any of it.The case is among several in which the helpline has prevented stolen money from disappearing into criminal accounts. Between Jan and July this year, it helped block or save Rs 162 crore.Since its launch in 2022, it has helped prevent losses of Rs 552 crore. Officials said the system is most effective when victims report the fraud with complete transaction details within the crucial “golden hour”.In June, an employee of a leading multiplex chain was tricked into transferring Rs 10.4 crore of company funds through 63 transactions. He believed he was communicating with the firm’s executive director, but the fraudster had simply used the director’s photograph as a WhatsApp display picture. Claiming he was about to enter a meeting and urgently needed the money, the scammer pressured the employee into making the transfers. Once the fraud was detected, the 1930 helpline managed to block or recover Rs 5.7 crore.The helpline received 2.7 lakh calls from cyber fraud victims between Jan and July, including 53,000 in July alone. During the month, it helped save or block Rs 24.5 crore. Officers said the recovered money is returned to victims after court orders are obtained.Apart from the helpline, timely intervention by the cyber police during an ongoing scam has also proved critical. In one case, a south Mumbai senior citizen visited a bank to transfer a large sum through RTGS. Suspicious of his vague explanation, the bank teller alerted the South Cyber Police, who rushed to the branch and prevented him from transferring any more money beyond the amount he had already sent.In another incident last month, a businessman from Malabar Hill received a call from a fraudster posing as a police officer, falsely accusing him of involvement in illegal activities. Panicked, he confided in a neighbour who knew deputy police commissioner Bajrang Bansode of the Mumbai cyber wing. Within minutes of being alerted, Bansode confirmed it was a scam and dispatched cyber police personnel to the businessman’s home to assist him.

Mumbai: Bombay High Court has rapped the deputy registrar, cooperative societies (K-West ward), for reopening proceedings on June 1 over bifurcating a housing society in Andheri West after a proposal was already rejected by his predecessor.Justice Sandeep Marne in Tuesday’s verdict said merely because the officer who passed the April 21 order got transferred, “the same did not give any authority to the successor officer to undertake re-adjudication of the proceedings. What is done by the new incoming officer on the post of deputy registrar is an action unknown to law.”Shiv Shopping Centre CHSL comprises 63 residences and 28 shops. Seventeen shop owners sought the society’s bifurcation. In a Nov 2025 general body meeting, the majority voted against it as it would disrupt ongoing redevelopment. On April 21, the deputy registrar in a “detailed and reasoned” 16-page order rejected the 17 members’ proposal, saying it is not appropriate to divide the society. He sent the order to Mumbai District Housing Federation for its opinion. His successor on June 1, stating that the bifurcation proposal was “closed for orders,” issued notices for a hearing on June 8. He also sought the federation’s opinion. On June 16, HC stayed further hearings.Senior advocate Birendra Saraf for two members argued that the April 21 communication was the deputy registrar’s “remarks” and not an “order,” rejecting the proposal. But Justice Marne noted that the successor officer, in his affidavit, “himself admitted” his predecessor had rejected the proposal subject to obtaining the federation’s opinion. The judge said rejection cannot be subject to federation’s opinion. He agreed with the society’s advocate Mayur Khandeparkar that after rejection, calling for the federation’s opinion was unnecessary. Only if the registrar prepares a draft scheme for bifurcation, the federation’s opinion is to be sought.Justice Marne said the predecessor deputy registrar had rejected the proposal at the “threshold” and had not deemed it necessary to prepare a draft scheme as he had formed an opinion against bifurcation. Therefore, he had passed the April 21 “order” rejecting the proposal, the judge concluded. He further said the successor seeking to re-adjudicate the rejected bifurcation proposal “is like exercising the power of review which the deputy registrar does not possess.” “This court deprecates the enthusiasm exhibited by the (successor) deputy registrar,” he added. Setting aside the June 1 communication, he said the 17 members are free to prosecute their appeal against the April 21 order.

Mumbai: Observing that some of the content was “vile’’ “abusive’’ and “certainly defamatory’’, Bombay high court on Wednesday granted urgent interim relief to Union transport minister Nitin Gadkari and directed social media intermediaries to remove posts, including videos, that linked him to the ethanol-blended fuel (EBP) controversy.Gadkari had sought judicial intervention against Meta platforms, X Corp, Google LLC, and others to delete online content he alleged were “false, fabricated, and defamatory”, AI-generated deepfake videos and other manipulated digital content linking him incorrectly to EBP programme.Passing the order, a single-judge bench of Justice Arif Doctor said the online platforms ought to have prepared a framework to take down such content without necessitating a court intervention each time.Gadkari’s suit, argued by his counsel Sandeep Ladda, contended that the online posts went beyond legitimate political criticism or satire and transgressed on his personal rights, his public persona, his personality rights with “profane and abusive’’ content. The Union minister sought Rs 11 crore in damages from John Doe (unnamed and unidentified persons or entities) who posted the “malicious, false…’’ content.“I can only say that the same is absolutely vile and abusive,’’ Justice Doctor said, on seeing the content Ladda cited. “Such material should have no place on a public platform, which is accessible to everyone, including young.’’The HC asked the counsel for Meta and others, if the intermediaries had any measures in place for taking down defamatory content and directed them to give “basic customer information’’ of content creators which Gadkari can use to add them as parties.The Centre introduced ethanol-blended fuel in 2003 as a national policy and the programme is exclusively administered by the petroleum ministry, said Gadkari’s suit, where he has “no role’’ to play. Motorists and critics have claimed that blended fuel corrodes fuel tanks in older or non-compliant cars.The HC granted Gadkari the liberty to convey to the online platforms any future abusive content and to approach the court in case of any “grey area’’ and kept the matter after four weeks again.

Multiple services in govt hospitals were crippled on Wednesday

Mumbai: On Day 2 of the strike called by resident doctors in Maharashtra over allowing homeopaths to practise modern medicine based on a one-year certificate course, multiple services in govt hospitals were crippled on Wednesday. The national-level Indian Medical Association (IMA) entered the fray, warning the state govt that if the move is not rolled back, there will be a pan-India strike of doctors and medical students.With 12,000 junior doctors on strike, including over 2,000 at the four BMC-run medical colleges in the city, routine outpatient and inpatient services, elective surgeries and central laboratory services were among those suspended. Patients with no severities were turned away at many hospitals. Similar disruptions were reported across the state.At the time of going to press, Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) said the strike will now be indefinite and will include withdrawal of all routine clinical, academic and non-critical emergency services until further notice. At govt hospitals, these services are managed entirely by resident doctors and their withdrawal would mean severe disruptions.Medical education secretary Dheeraj Kumar asked the state IMA to withdraw the strike, but it refused.No additional homeopaths were registered during the day by Maharashtra Medical Council since Neha Pawar’s enlistment on Tuesday.As the strike intensified, govt hospitals across the state asked professors and senior resident doctors with some interns to attend to OPD calls.OPD numbers at state-run JJ Hospital fell by 23% till noon, from a daily average of 1,735 to 1,333. Patient admissions dropped significantly—from 102 on average daily to just 12. At least 10 elective surgeries by the hospital’s general surgery department were postponed. As opposed to its daily average of 39, the hospital just performed four major procedures. Similar disruptions were seen at the four BMC-run medical colleges.A doctor from JJ Hospital’s surgery department said some residents still attended to patients on compassionate grounds. “We do not want patients to suffer. Many of them come from far away. We are requesting govt to not push us further.”An intern at the facility’s medicine department said there was just one resident doctor on call for severe cases. “The unit is usually packed with a few resident doctors and interns.”Even the pulmonary department, which caters to a large number of TB patients, faced disruptions as no resident was there to look after the pulmonary function test.MARD president Dr Atharva Shinde said, “If the doctors do not strike now, human lives and patient safety in the long run would be impacted as more and more unqualified individuals would prescribe medicines haphazardly.”Elsewhere in the state, outpatient services were badly affected, including at Govt Medical College and Hospital and Indira Gandhi Govt Medical College and Hospital in Nagpur. The response from Pune’s doctors and hospitals was mixed—while OPDs and elective procedures were affected in some hospitals, they remained operational as usual in others.The private medical sector, which has many state IMA members, was largely unaffected by the strike call.While warning of a pan-India strike in a letter to CM Devendra Fadnavis, IMA’s national unit flagged that dual medical council registration is unprecedented and not allowed anywhere in India. “It is neither well thought out nor justified. There are no guidelines or SOPs laid out for the same. It also creates misinformation among the general public about the qualifications and capabilities of the doctor in treating their ailments,” said the letter. (With additional reporting from Nagpur and Pune)Nod given only on Aug 4, but giving out modern meds since 2017Chembur-based homeopath Neha Pawar became eligible to prescribe modern medicines only on Tuesday, but she disclosed to TOI that she has been prescribing allopathic drugs since 2017.She completed her one-year certificate course in modern pharmacology in 2022.Operating out of a clinic in Mankhurd, which sees high rates of infectious diseases, Pawar said she routinely provides medical services for complex conditions such as TB and even Guillain-Barré Syndrome. “No problem has happened till now. Even my patients have no issues with me being a homeopath.”Bahubali Shah, administrator of the homeopathic council, said on Tuesday homeopaths and other practitioners of alternative forms of medicines have been prescribing modern medicines to patients for years. IMA member Dr Jayesh Lele said the association has been opposing such quackery through “mixopathy”.