BHOPAL: Two men from Bihar’s Jamui district and Uttar Pradesh’s Meerut have emerged as key Indian players in an international cyber-slavery racket that lured unemployed youths with fake overseas job offers and forced them into cyber scam operations in militia-controlled areas of Myanmar.
The accused, Faiz Akram (32) from Aliganj village in Jamui and Mohit Agrawal (30) from Meerut, were recently arrested by the Madhya Pradesh Police cyber cell for trafficking a young Scheduled Caste graduate from Bhopal, Jitendra Ahirwar, into cyber slavery in Myanmar.
Confirming the arrests, Madhya Pradesh police SP – Cyber Cell HQ Pranay Nagwanshi told TNIE that Faiz and Mohit are part of different layers of the racket, while the main mastermind in India is still at large. “Our teams are now conducting raids at multiple locations and are confident of arresting him soon.”
Jitendra was lured in early 2025 through a fake job advertisement circulated on Instagram. He first came in contact with Faiz Akram, who promised him a well-paying data entry job in Thailand, posing as an employee of a recruitment agency. In reality, Akram was a lower-level agent in a larger cyber fraud and slavery network operating across Thailand, Myanmar and nearby regions.
After agreeing to the offer, Jitendra underwent an online interview through Telegram with members of the fake agency, including Mohit Agrawal, who mainly operated from Southeast Asia. He was later told that he had been selected for the job, and his travel expenses were fully covered by Agrawal and his associates.
On reaching Thailand in early 2025, Jitendra was taken by taxi to the Thailand-Myanmar border and then transported by boat across the Moei river into Myawaddy, a high-risk trade town in southeastern Myanmar, parts of which are controlled by armed rebel militia.
There, Jitendra’s expectations of a good job turned into a nightmare. He was confined in a small section of a compound that housed multiple cyber scam operations, including the KK Park Compound, guarded by armed militia.
For the next five to six months, Jitendra was held captive and forced to work as a cyber scammer until he was rescued by the Myanmar military in December 2025. He lived in a dormitory with double-decker beds alongside other victims from countries such as India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Kenya and Ethiopia.
He was made to pose as a caller targeting people in India and other countries through fake investment and romance scams. Victims were gradually convinced to invest money in fraudulent schemes before being cheated completely.
“Jitendra’s life was confined from the dormitory to a small room office, where he was made to work for abnormally long hours, often denied food on not meeting daily fraud targets. He was also physically assaulted, while some other youths who either did not cooperate with the fraudsters or didn’t meet the targets were even subjected to harsher cruelty, including electric shocks,” MP cyber cell cops probing the case said.
The scammers told the victims that they had to work to repay the money spent on transporting them to Thailand and Myanmar.
Jitendra was rescued during a military raid on the compound and was later sent to Thailand before being safely repatriated to India. After returning to Bhopal, he reported the entire incident to the Madhya Pradesh Police, leading to a case being registered in December 2025.
