The Chhattisgarh Director General of Police, Arun Dev Gautam, has submitted a report to a Delhi court in connection with allegations that IPS officer Rahul Bansal and two others accepted a bribe to cover up a multi-crore cyber fraud. Bansal has denied the allegations against him, even as a CBI court continues to hear the case.The allegations stem from a Rs 21.15 lakh cyber fraud case from last year at Chhattisgarh’s Ambikapur Cyber Police Station. In his complaint to the police, a man alleged that he had lost a hefty sum in 84 transactions through two fake trading platforms. A team led by Bansal, a 2022-batch IPS officer, investigated the case and filed a chargesheet against 23 people last year.According to the CBI court’s July 1 order, the complainant approached the court when no action was taken by either the Chhattisgarh Police or the CBI. Investigators say the inquiry eventually led the police to uncover an alleged multi-state, internationally operated cyber-fraud network, with the police arresting 23 people in total.The complaint before the Ambikapur police alleged that the IPS officer, through two other policemen, demanded a bribe of Rs 1.5 crore to stop the investigation. Of this, Rs 1 crore was allegedly paid.Bansal has denied any wrongdoing, saying: “The allegations are baseless. The complaint is currently before the court, and I have complete faith in the judicial process and the law.”When contacted, Sarguja Range Inspector General of Police Deepak Kumar Jha told The Indian Express that the fraud was a “sophisticated, multi-state, internationally operated organised cyber-fraud syndicate” and named two key suspects, Haryana’s Anshul Ginotra and Delhi’s Garvit Jain. The two are absconding, and the police have issued non-bailable warrants against them. He also said he was looking into the bribery allegations. The ‘fraud’According to police sources, suspects used 38 fake trading portals serving 19,340 users to commit the alleged fraud. Investigators say a multi-state and international network operated fake trading platforms, used mule bank accounts and fintech payment gateways, and moved proceeds through hawala and cryptocurrency to overseas destinations.Story continues below this ad“Analysis of two platforms alone found cryptocurrency-linked transactions exceeding Rs 1,880 crore in four months. The combined investigation across supplementary chargesheets 3, 4, and 5 transformed a localised cyber fraud case into one of the largest national ‘dabba trading’ and fintech money-laundering busts. The main thing was that the accused didn’t use their real names but pseudonyms. They also used virtual numbers and numbers in the names of other persons,” said a police officer involved in the probe.While ‘dabba trading’ is an illegal form of trading where bets or trades are settled privately rather than through recognised stock exchanges, fintech money laundering uses digital payment systems, apps, wallets, cryptocurrencies, and related financial technology channels to move and disguise illicit money.An investigation-linked ledger also allegedly recorded Rs 601.90 crore in laundering flows in less than two months, while gateway collections exceeded Rs 275.41 crore in October 2025 alone, probe officers say. The remaining 36 portals are still under investigation.The network allegedly had separate layers for developing the platforms, operating them, supplying bank accounts, processing payments, and moving money through cash, hawala, and cryptocurrency, it is alleged.Story continues below this adAbout Rs 690 crore was identified as having passed through one fintech payment network, though investigators said the actual amount could be higher. In one instance, a single virtual ID allegedly processed Rs 8.86 crore through 822 transactions in one day.The money was allegedly moved through cash management services and hawala networks, including cash movements of Rs 50 lakh to Rs 1 crore a day in Delhi, it is alleged.In Dubai, rupee proceeds were allegedly converted into UAE dirhams, while cryptocurrency was also transferred to Chinese vendors for betting/gaming balances and server costs.The probe has led to 23 arrests across eight states. Investigators now believe the network may have been operating since 2022, indicating that its actual scale could be larger.