A team of Bidhannagar police seized more than Rs 3.85 crore during raids on two flats in New Town’s Sankalpa II Housing Complex on Wednesday.
Police said two brothers from Howrah, who allegedly owned and operated multiple fraudulent call centres in New Town and Salt Lake, had stashed the money.
Officers said they raided the flats after questioning Shashi Gaurav Soni and his brother Saurabh Soni.
They were arrested on Sunday.
The deputy commissioner of police, New Town, Praveen Prakash, said: “We found more than Rs 3.85 crore in cash that was wrapped in plastic sheets. Apart from the cash, we found 11 watches, gold rings and a cash counting machine.”
According to Prakash, the cash had no requisite paperwork or bank records.
The police said they had sealed at least 10 call centres that the Sonis used to run in New Town and Salt Lake.
“More than 400 computers used in the call centres owned by the brothers have also been seized,” a police officer said.
The Land Rover Discovery Sport, (right) the Land Rover Defender SE and the revolver and bullets that were seized by police on Sunday
The police have also sealed a paying guest accommodation in Salt Lake’s BG Block that was taken on rent by the Sonis for their workers.
“The money that we seized from the two flats is a part of the ill-gotten wealth of the Sonis. They also used cryptocurrency to stash their wealth and would often use hawala channels to transfer money,” said Prakash.
On Sunday, a Land Rover Defender SE — an SUV with a Rs 1 crore-plus price tag — a Land Rover Discovery Sport, a kilo of gold, cash, deeds of flats and plots, and a revolver and six bullets were seized from the Howrah brothers after being arrested for allegedly running multiple fraudulent call centres and duping people in India and abroad.
The police consider the brothers among the top players in a call centre racket in the city.
The police sent a team to the Sonis’ house in Liluah after their names apparently surfaced while questioning four men from Ahmedabad and New Delhi who were recently arrested during raids on call centres in New Town and Salt Lake, an officer said.
“Based on the statements of these men, we mounted a surveillance on the two brothers in Liluah,” said the officer.