Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd- Calculated Fraud and Cheating

IMPORTANT NEWS- URGENT ISSUE

28.01.2021

This Company Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd has been ordered for Liquidation by National Company Law Tribunal New Delhi Bench ( Court-II) in IA-3934/ND/2020 in Company Petition No. (IB) -1028(ND) 2018 In the Matter of M/s Esspee Hitech Pvt Ltd Verses M/s Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd on 18.01.2021 and Mr. Rajiv Bhatnagar an Insolvency Professional, IBBI Registration Number (IBBI?IPA-001?IPP00075/2017-18/10160) has been appointed as liquidator.

Now On 21.01.2021 issued a Public Announcement Notice asking Under Regulation 12 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India ( Liquidation Process) Regulations, 2016, For attention of the stake holders of Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd to submit their claims . 

The financial Creditors shall submit their claims with proof by electronic means only. All other creditors may submit the claims with the proof in person, by Post or by electronic means.

Last date for submitting claims is 17.02.2021

Address and email of the liquidator as registered and shown in notice:

Rajiv Bhatnagar & co.Chartered Accountants, C- 1st Floor, Corporation Bank Building, Avas Vikas Nainital Road, Rudarpur, Udham Singh Nagar, Uttarakhand- 263153

Email: ablazeliquidator@gmail.com, carajivbhatnagar@gmail.com

date : 21.01.2021

Rudarpur 

it is for all information.

Thanks & Regards

Dr. Zulfiqar Ali Khan

Advocate

Supreme Court of India

MB: 9884102961

Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd  

CALCULATED FRAUD & CHEATING

The company named " Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd" registered office at Shop no. 107 First Floor, Rishab IPEX Mall IP Extension, Delhi, New Delhi  - 110092,

Delhi - India 

Directors:

The company has 2 directors and no reported key management personnel. The directors are Anubhav Mittal (DIN 03156414) appointed on 7 September 2010 and Ayushi Agarwal (DIN 07478873) appointed 03 March 2016. 

The longest serving director currently on board is Anubhav Mittal who was appointed on 07 September, 2010. Anubhav Mittal has been on the board for more than 7 years. 

The most recently appointed director is Ayushi Agarwal, who was appointed on 03 March, 2016. 

Anubhav Mittal has the largest number of other directorships with a seat at a total of 4 companies. In total, the company is connected to 3 other companies through its directors.

CIN No:  U72900DL2010PTC207909, This company was INCORPORATED oN DATED 07 September, 2010

MLM / CHAIN MONEY

SocialTrade.biz, owned by Ghaziabad-based Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd, claims to provide a unique concept of online barter system through its Social Media Exchange (SME). However, on probing further, the whole scheme looks like a money circulation scheme, where the user gets paid not for clicking on more 'likes' or promotions, but by enrolling more people in right-left (binary) combination.

SUBSCRIBE

 The website claims "Social Media Exchange acts as a platform where a give and take relationship is built between different customers. You make others popular and others advertise you in return. SME refers to reciprocity (exchange) between two or more actors, generally for mutual benefit."

 Ablaze Info Solutions, under the SME offers four different ‘packages’ to earn money. This ranges from Rs5,750 to Rs.57,500. On buying one of the packages, the user receives commission for daily tasks at the rate of 5Rs per click. The company does not mention what is ‘R’, but it appears to be denotation for rupees. In addition, there are promotional and referral income, which at present is 1000Rs for selling two packages in 1:1 business volume (BV) format. This is nothing but the binary format used by most multi-level marketing (MLM) operators. 

The company also claims to provide an income, based on the BV and social trade package (STP), of 50,000Rs to 2 lakh Rs per week, which is says is ‘capped’. It also deducts administration charges on the promotional income besides deducting tax at source (TDS) too.

Payout packages: As we all know, several sites like Google and Facebook pay money to sites hosting their ads. This is mostly based on cost per click (CPC) or click through rate (CTR). There is another factor, the keyword that decides the CPC or CTR. Most effective keywords and the subsequent CPC or CTR receives good rates from advertisers. However, for the hosting sites, the income is not too big (as claimed by Socialtrade.biz) and that too varies as per the total number of visitors and clicks on the particular advertisement. 
However, none of these appears to make any sense for Socialtrade.biz. Because it feels one person will pay the other for such clicks and vice versa and both will earn money! “On one hand, it allows you to increase your social penetration and internet popularity while on the other, you get paid for promoting others on social media, which implies a user is both a consumer and service provider,” the website says.

In short, as per the company claims, once you buy a STP 100 package by paying Rs57,500, you can earn a maximum of 2 Rs per week. 

According to one person, who is in this business, Socialtrade.biz says that it is promoting websites of clients. “However, most of the websites are not active and appears to be created in-house and yet they claim to pay five rupees for promoting these sites,” the person, who does not want to be named, says.

In short, the claims and use of attractive terminologies like Social Media Exchange may sound too good, but Socialtrade.biz shows all the signs of a money circulation scheme and nothing else. Few years ago, one company Speak Asia too entered in the market by claiming to provide big income by just filing out surveys on the internet. This claim and the company’s modus operandi were exposed by Moneylife. Main promoters of Speak Asia are absconding and the so called ‘investors’ who invested their hard earned money are doing rounds of the courts to recover their money. 

Since there is no email ID of Socialtrade.biz or Ablaze Info Solutions mentioned on their website, we sent them a message through their online facility. We will incorporate their response in this story as and when we receive it.  

 ANUBHAV MITTAL:

Anubhav Mittal, the 26-year-old mastermind of the Ponzi scheme that swindled more than 6 lakh people, started on the wrong path in his college days itself. Ablaze Info Solutions Private Limited, the company used to fleece over 6 lakh people through a Ponzi scheme based on hitting like buttons, was started by Mittal back in 2011 while he was still doing his BTech from a private college in Greater Noida.Mittal, police said, used a fake address in Delhi’s Chandni Chowk to register the company. He named himself and his father Sunil Mittal directors. But Ablaze saw little business. In 2011, it netted just Rs 70,000. Mittal completed his BTech the same year but persisted with Ablaze.

But business grew slowly. Till 2015, the annual revenue was between Rs 3 lakh and Rs 4 lakh, police said.Mittal, who lives in Ghaziabad, then came up with Social Trade and built a ruse around a prevalent practice among companies of buying likes for social media visibility. He had no clients but he knew technology enough to know how to subvert it. He sold a fake scheme but had no problem finding subscribers as he dangled the bait of easy money.

It was through the subscriptions that he met his partner in crime, Shridhar Prasad, an MBA who had worked in several private companies and floated a startup called Move-N that failed. He needed money. His wife had subscribed to Social Trade and

Prasad sensed an opportunity.

After a meeting with Mittal, Prasad was inducted into Ablaze as CEO. Mittal and Prasad now hold the key to an investigation that could spread across several Indian cities. Police said the money deposited in their company’s bank accounts was frequently transferred to different accounts that are now under the scanner. Any Ponzi scheme is illegal and punishable under the Prize Chits and Money Circulation Schemes (Banning) Act 1978. The role of some bank officials is also under scrutiny, police said. Investigators have not ruled out more arrests in the coming days. The income tax department, Sebi and RBI have been informed, police said. The Noida-STF is seeking the help of forensic experts in

B Tech graduate Anubhav Mittal (26) was arrested in February last year on the charges of running a Ponzi scheme. It was alleged that Mittal’s company Ablaze Info Solutions Private Limited that operated from Noida had tricked more than 6 lakh people into giving him their money through a Ponzi scheme that promised big returns for hitting ‘likes’ online. The company allegedly perpetrated a fraud of Rs 3,700 crore employing this

Noida Ponzi scam: ED files fresh case under PMLA

New Delhi, May 2 () The ED has registered a fresh money laundering case against the owner of a Noida-based firm and others as part of its probe in the alleged Rs 3,700 crore ponzi scam perpetrated by him after promising money in lieu of 'likes' on social media to lakhs of gullible investors.

Officials said the agency has booked a fresh Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR), ED equivalent of a police FIR, on the basis of "new facts" arising out of the investigation conducted by it till now against the alleged "mastermind" of the scam and owner of the accused firm Anubhav Mittal and his enterprise. "He (Mittal) is alleged to have misused forged/expired ISO certificates for portraying the business of his company as a genuine before the public as well as government agencies," the Enforcement Directorate (ED) said in a statement.

It said the agency has moved a fresh application in a competent court seeking permission to interrogate Mittal and others in the "light of new facts". The ED had in March attached assets worth Rs 599 crore in this case after it registered its first ECIR based on the FIR of the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STF). The agency will soon record the statement of Mittal's father, Sunil Mittal, who is lodged in Luksar jail in Greater Noida near here. Mittal, the agency had earlier said, had collected "several thousand crore of rupees from the customers of his company by false inducements and later siphoned off the same by means of generating false or bogus bills/invoices with the assistance of various persons who are under scrutiny".

The ED's zonal office in Lucknow had on January 5 registered a criminal case under the PMLA based on UP Police's STF which had first unearthed the alleged illegal ponzi or multi-level marketing scam. Describing the modus operandi used by the accused to perpetrate the ponzi scam, the ED had said an analysis of the bank statements of the companies involved reveals a "phenomenal increase" in the number of transactions since March 2016 and during a period of around one month a "turnover of more than Rs 40 crore was achieved".

The central probe agency had said the fraudsters allegedly cheated about 6.5 lakh gullible investors of an estimated Rs 3,700 crore, a fraud many more times in value than the infamous Saradha chit fund scam of West Bengal and Assam which is pegged at Rs 2,500 crore. Meanwhile, UP police yesterday filed a charge-sheet at the Gautam Buddha Nagar District Court against Mittal and his wife Ayushi, who are both directors at Ablaze Info Solution Private Limited. Ayushi has got a stay order from the High Court on her arrest, while Mittal and three others have been arrested by the UP STF in this case. NES KIS

Noida man dupes 6 lakh people of Rs 3,700 crore

A 26-year-old BTech graduate tricked more than 6 lakh people into giving him their money through a Ponzi scheme that promised big returns for hitting ‘likes’ online. In a little over a year, Anubhav Mittal’s Social Trade perpetrated a fraud of Rs 3,700 crore.

The scheme operated through a maze of dubious URLs (online links) sent to phones of subscribers that they were asked to click. Cheekily, these would sometimes be links to Facebook or Twitter profiles of other subscribers. A fake server was set up where these links would terminate.

The scam surfaced with the arrest of Mittal and his two aides — 40-yearold Shridhar Prasad, an MBA, and 25-year-old Mahesh Dayal, who served as tech support — from an office in Noida’s Sector 63 on Thursday.

They had floated a fake company called Ablaze Info Solutions Private Limited that operated from there. The STF team that raided the office found 250 passports, purportedly of some high performers and employees of the fraudsters, who were to be rewarded with a trip to Australia.

The investigation also led police to Rs 520 crore deposited in 12 accounts of the company registered in Canara Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Yes Bank and Axis Bank. The officials are investigating the company’s balance sheet, investors’ information, and bank accounts to which money was transferred.

Noida has seen a series of call centre fraud busted over the past couple of years but this is the first racket to come to light that  used ‘like-trading’ for a Ponzi scheme and perpetrated a fraud of this scale. Buying likes is common practice among companies

that want to look better on social media.

That is what Mittal’s Social Trade used to spin its yarn — investors were told the company got business from a third party to increase the latter’s online hits on digital platforms. The investors were given 25, 50, 75 and 125 URLs on their phones every

day, based on the ‘subscription plan’.

Amit Pathak, senior superintendent of police, STF, said the trio had launched Social Trade as a pyramid scheme in 2015, telling people they could earn sitting from home. “They enrolled people with subscription money ranging from Rs 5,750, Rs 11,500, Rs.28,750 and Rs 57,500. The investors were given a user ID and password and told they would get random URLs on their phone and would be paid Rs 5 per like,” Pathak said.

For this purpose, they used Ablaze, which rented a four-storey building in Sector 63 for its office. Investors were told that they would receive monthly payments in their registered bank accounts. They were also told if they brought in more subscribers

within 21 days, their income would increase. This process was called a ‘booster’ and, like any other Ponzi scheme, helped build a pyramid of investors. Till Thursday, the number of subscriptions had reached around 6.5 lakh.

As the numbers soared, so did the risks. Most people did not receive the payments they were promised and began complaining. Some went to the police. An FIR was registered at Surajpur police station on January 31 and another FIR on February 1 at Phase III police station. The case was handed over to the STF. It emerged during the probe that around 1 lakh people had filed complaints on emails and text messages to Ablaze for non-payment of dues.

“We found there was no business from any third party for getting online hits. The probe shows the accused had set up a fake server in Ghaziabad and the URL links terminated on the same server,” Pathak said.

The trio also shifted the domain name of their website frequently to hoodwink police. The Social Trade website — socialtrade.biz — was transferred to freehub.com in December 2016. Ten days later, it was shifted to intmart.com. On January 27, the business was shifted to frenzzup.com. Last week the accused had also changed the company’s name and put up a board of W-3 Company.

Ablaze paid monthly rent of Rs 7 lakh for the office. Mitta took home a ‘salary’ of Rs 5 lakh a month while Shridhar received Rs 1 lakh. Police said subscription money was their only revenue and the scheme was doomed to fail.

What is a Ponzi scheme?

A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation where the operator promises and pays initial investors short-term returns that are far higher or unusually consistent compared to other investment options available in the market — not from profit earned from legitimate business, but from new capital collected from newer investors, enticed by the promise of high returns.

It's named after Charles Ponzi, who became notorious for using the technique in the US in 1920, borrowing from an idea present in novels such as Charles Dickens' Martin Chuzzlewit and Little Dorrit.Protest for and against Mittal

Hundreds of investors gathered outside the office of Ablaze Info Solutions Private Limited in Sector 63 on Thursday when they came to know that the money they had invested in the company disappeared. However, it was a bizarre situation with a group

of investors protesting in support of accused Anubhav Mittal and his company while another group protested against the company. The investors started reaching the office since morning and enquired about the issue from the guards and other staff. A group of investors claimed they were getting the returns as promised by the company officials and the crackdown was not justifiable.

The investors started a protest and also raised slogans in support of Mittal. “I invested Rs 57,500 in the company and also got the return as promised. The police action is not good,” said Sanjeev Kumar, an investor.

However, a few people also protested against the company and its officials.

ED seizes Rs 600cr assets of Mittal in Noida Ponzi scam

TNN | Mar 31, 2017

The Enforcement Directorate has seized assets worth Rs 600 crore held by Anubhav Mittal, director of Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd in connection with the multi-crore Ponzi scam busted in February.

The directorate has attached the bank balances, funds available with a payment gateway and immovable properties to the tune of Rs 599,28,15,577 owned by Mittal and the other companies incorporated by him.

The Special Task Force of state police had busted the Rs 3,726 crore scam on February 2 and arrested Mittal and his two associates, Shridhar Prasad and Mahesh Dayal, for duping over 6.5 lakh people from their Sector 63 office in Noida.The accused had told investors that the company got business from a third party to increase the latter’s online hits on digital platforms. The investors were given 25, 50, 75 and 125 URLs on their phones every day as per their subscription plans.The investors needed to get subscription and the fee ranged from Rs 5,750 to Rs 11,500, Rs 28,750 and Rs 57,500 for each IDs.

The accused amassed Rs 3,726 crore from scores of investors in the process.

The fraud came to light when some people claimed that they had not got the money even after clicking the URLs. They registered an FIR at Surajpur police station on January 31 and another FIR on February 1 at Phase III police station for cheating

and criminal breach of trust under sections 420 and 406 of IPC.Later the accused were arrested from their company office. The ED started investigating the case after registering a case under Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

“Anubhav Mittal had collected crores of rupees from the customers of his company through false inducements and later siphoned off the same by generating false/bogus bills/invoices with the assistance of various persons who are under scrutiny,” the ED said in a statement on Friday.

This case is also being investigated by Uttar Pradesh STF, Income Tax department and the Serious Fraud Investigation Office under Union ministry of corporate affairs. Raj Kumar Mishra, DSP, STF-Noida said their team is investigating various aspects of the case.

As per the legal course, the chargesheet has to be filed within 90 days of arrest.“We are working on the case and the chargesheet will be filed on time,” he said.Mishra said that the STF team had been searching for Anubhav Mittal’s father Suneel Mittal and wife Ayushi Mittal but they are still at large.

“Both of them are accused in the case. We are in the process of approaching the court to get a non-bailable warrant issued against them,” he said.

-----------------------

The ED had in March attached assets worth Rs599 crore. With this attachment, the total value of seized assets in the case has gone up to over Rs. 654 crore.

A provisional attachment order issued by the central probe agency’s joint director Rajeshwar Singh (Lucknow zonal unit) said an amount of Rs40 crore lying in a Yes bank account, Rs5.09 crore funds kept in an escrow account of ICICI bank, fix deposit receipts of Rs3.61 crore and a commercial property in Greater Noida worth over Rs6 crore has been attached under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

The value of assets attached under today’s order is over Rs55.43 crore, a senior official said. The case involves a firm named Ablaze Info Solution Pvt. Ltd and it is owned by the alleged kingpin of this alleged Ponzi scam case—Anubhav Mittal.

CASES:

ADDL Chief Judicial Magistrate- COURT No. 6, GHAZIABAD

Case Type: Charge Sheet
Filing Number: 22931/2018Filing Date: 20-06-2018
Registration Number: 17215/2018Registration Date: 22-12-2017
CNR Number: UPGZ04-030959-2018

First Hearing Date: 04th July 2018
Next Hearing Date: 01st August 2018
Stage of Case: Appearance
Court Number and Judge: 46-A.C.J.M. Court No. 6

1) State
 Vs
Respondent and Advocate

1) Anubhav Mittal

FIR Details

Police Station: KAVI NAGAR
FIR Number: 259
Year: 2017

2. ADDL Chief Judicial Magistrate- COURT No.7 GHAZIABAD

Case Type: Cri. Case
Filing Number: 24891/2018Filing Date: 27-05-2018
Registration Number: 3523/2018Registration Date: 07-11-2017
CNR Number: UPGZ04-033034-2018

Next Hearing Date: 07th August 2018

1) State

VS.

1) Anubhav mittal and other

FIR DETAILS:

Police Station: INDRAPURAM
FIR Number: 147
Year: 2017

3.  Crime No. 93/2017

U/s 420, 409, 467,468, 471, 34, 120-B , IPC, 3/4/5/6 Prize Chits and Money Circulation Scheme (Banning Act) 1978

PS. Surajpur (Gautam Budh Nagar- Distt, Pending before Addl CJM Gautam Budh Nagar (U.P)

4.) Cases at District and sessions Judge

i.        Criminal Misc/ 264/2017              Anubhav Mittal Vs U.P State

ii.       Criminal revision /73/2017 Anubhav Mittal Vs U.P State

iii.      Criminal Revision/71/2017 Anubhav Mittal Vs U.P State

iv.      Bail Application/4269/2017  UP State  Vs Anubhav Mittal

5.      Case filed U/s 156(3) Cr PC by Amit Garg Vs. Anubhav Mittal  and others  Crl App. 699/2017, Chief Judicial Magistrate Ghaziabad

6.    Crl cases/3523/2018 , UP State  Vs Anubhav Mittal  and others , Before Chief Judicial Magistrate Ghaziabad,

7.      Crime No. 163/2017

U/s 420, 406, 467,468, 471, 34, 120-B , IPC, 3/4 Prize Chits and Money Circulation Scheme (Banning Act) 1978

PS. PHASE-III (Gautam Budh Nagar- Distt

Pending before Addl CJM Gautam Budh Nagar (U.P)

8.      Bail Applications at High Court of Allahabad:

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.1437 of 2018

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.12758 of 2017

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.26511 of 2017

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.37868 of 2017

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.43672 of 2017

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.4310 of 2018

Criminal Misc  Bail application No.6972 of 2018

               (Anubhav Mittal Vs U.P State)-----PENDING

9. IN THE NATIONAL COMPANY LAW TRIBUNAL, NEW DELHI PRINCIPAL BENCH

        CP NO. 408(ND) /2017

        Shumanto Gupta Vs. M/s Ablaze Info Solutions Pvt Ltd & Ors

        Filed U/s 245 of Companies Act.                                               -----PENDING

NOTE:

1.  The matter is under investigation of SFIO (serious Fraud Investigation Office , Delhi)

2. Special Investigation Team (SIT) doing investigation

3. Chargesheet ( which runs to 35000 pages and includes bank statements packed in boxes and case diaries submitted before Court of ACJM Gautam Budh nagar) has been filed against Anubhav Mittal and his wife Ayushi both Directors of Ablaze info Solutions Pvt Ltd, along with Anubhav Mittal father who was former director of company and three others at Ghaziabad , Charge sheet/  17215/2018 U/s 420,406,467,471,12B 34

4. Number of cases filed by investors at National Company Law Tribunal , Principal Bench, New Delhi

5. The ED registered a criminal case under the PMLA based on an FIR of the Uttar Pradesh Police’s Special Task Force (STF).

Thanks & Regards

Dr.ZULFIQAR ALI KHAN, M.L( Contracts), M.Phil(Law), Ph.D

Advocate & Legal Consultant

Supreme Court of Inda

No. 244, H-Block

Beta-II, Gr. Noida

Gautam Budh Nagar-distt

MB: 9884102961 / 9444412961