Brij Kishore Sah and (right) Gaurav Kumar in custody. Picture by Ranjeet Kumar Dey

A telecom company distributor gave the firm he worked for a harrowing time by duping it of lakhs of rupees by selling SIM cards.

Middle-aged Brij Kishore Sah was arrested on Wednesday with an accomplice.

Sah started trotting down the wrong lane a-year-and-a-half back to earn some quick bucks. The resident of Kankerbagh, who worked as a distributor for a private telecom company, procured postpaid SIM cards under fake names and sold them illegally to public phone booth owners across Bihar. The owners used the SIMs for commercial purposes leading to huge financial losses to the telecom company.

A police team acted on the complaints of the company and arrested Sah. The police had lodged an FIR after they found evidences against Sah. On Wednesday, a few officials of the company visited the Kankerbagh police station to lodge an FIR.

Sah led a gang of three to run the business. An aide of his, identified as Gaurav Kumar, has also been arrested. The police claimed to have got a list of 50 SIM cards that were sold to the booth owners. They are interrogating Sah and Gaurav.

The telecom company had told the police that the incurred losses run to more than Rs 30 lakh. However, a probe would determine the exact number of SIM cards used and the total loss.

Police said apart from selling SIM cards, Sah also ran a parallel business of letting people make calls from the SIM cards.

“According to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), a person can get at least nine postpaid SIM cards under one name. Sah procured the SIMs and then sold them to PCO owners. He sold them for Rs 2,000 per SIM card,” said deputy superintendent of police (sadar) Mutaffiq Ahmad.

He added that the booth owners readily bought them and did not care to verify anything about Sah.

“After the bills of the connections were not paid, the company started incurring losses. Sah, however, didn’t stop there as he started to make fake identities under different names to get more SIM cards. Sah even made PAN cards, voter identity cards, driving licences with his picture but under various names. The police are also trying to find out the source from where he procured the fake identities,” Ahmad said.

Sources said the telecom company smelt a rat after they found identity cards having Sah’s picture with different names.