A college student from Asansol allegedly masterminded a bank fraud and duped a private company in Bowbazar by making unauthorised transactions and transferring the money to multiple mule accounts.

Police said they traced the student, Abhishek Shaw, 24, through a mule account in a bank in Durgapur.

Shaw and four others have been arrested.

The police said the owner of the company mentioned in a complaint lodged in May that his firm had lost Rs 14.08 lakh, which was transferred from the account without his knowledge.

“During the investigation, we found that the money was transferred to five bank accounts and from there to multiple other accounts. One of the accounts, in a Durgapur bank, was opened by a man named Mohammad Shahid,” said an officer in the anti-bank fraud section of Kolkata Police.

The police tracked down Shahid and learned that he had been asked to open the account by two men, one of whom was a college student.

“The names of Abhishek Shaw and Abhijit Prasad cropped up during the investigation. They had persuaded Mohammad Shahid to open the account, which was later used for fraudulent transfer of funds,” the officer said.

Shaw, the suspected mastermind, was arrested in Kestopur on Tuesday night. Shabbir Alam, 24, from Munger district in Bihar, was also arrested from Kestopur on Tuesday night.

Two more persons who were allegedly involved in the fraud by arranging mule accounts have been arrested. They are Roopesh Kumar, 27, from Muzaffarpur in Bihar, and Amrit Chatterjee, 22, a resident of Asansol.

The fifth accused, Abhijit Prasad, 19, is from Asansol.

The police said Rs 7.50 lakh had been recovered till Wednesday.