Women Representatives from Fake LPG Companies Robbing Consumers: Facts

Story:

Be alert.
There is a lady (and may be a group of people) may come to your house and ask for annual membership of Rs 200 for gas stove maintenance. She is from so called ‘LPG’ company which is bogus company. She carries company id and set of membership cards and chloroform as well. She may ask for using your toilet and may call her group and explain the position and situation of the house and they will break in and rob each and every thing in your house , Do not allow her into your house , instead try to inform police immediately. Currently she/this group is operating very activelly.

Do send this message and save someone from robbery / life / untoward incident.

Picture about Women Representatives from Fake LPG Companies Robbing Consumers — Women Representatives from Fake LPG Companies Robbing Consumers

Analysis:

A message in several variants and languages doing rounds in India warn LPG consumers that a group of fake women representatives/surveyors from LPG companies are operating in gangs to approach them in the name of surveys, repair, maintenance and other services, only to end up robbing them! Today, we will analyze the background of these claims along with their authenticity.

In Past

In Nov 2013, Mahanagar Gas Ltd (MGL), a natural gas distribution company in Mumbai Metropolitan Region has warned its consumers that some fraudulent elements like Mahanagar Gas Stove Service Centre / Mahanagar Gas stove Service / Mahanagar Gas Service are posing as representatives of the company and approaching housing societies only to dupe people on the pretext of signing annual maintenance contracts. The warning came up after few such fraudulent activities involving women were reported by duped consumers in Bandra, Kandivali and elsewhere in Mumbai. We have seen such complaints online since at least 2011, like here, here and here. They also mentioned a fake contract card with invalid contact numbers for the annual maintenance they were duped with. Along with the warning, Mahanagar Gas Ltd also gave a list of Do’s and Don’ts for their consumers’ grievances in this respect.

Fraudulent activities mentioned above also turn into crime sometimes. In Jan. 2013, a robber posed as LPG man and stabbed a woman in Chennai for her jewellery. Similar robbing incidents occur in other parts of world as well. For example, in late 2014, RIT (riding-in-tandem) robbers disguised as LPG sales agents in Makati and stole away consumers’ tanks pretending to repair them.

In 2014

The story in question seems to have surfaced from a 13 October 2014 posting in a blog of Ganeshkhind Senior Citizens Club (puneseniors.blogspot.in) in Pune, Maharashtra. The message that comes with a photo identity card of a woman (picture below) shown as surveyor for Mahanagar Gas Stove Service (fake) warns Pune people that she along with her group come with chloroform to dupe the unsuspecting customers and rob their homes. Considering the facts mentioned above, it is possible that this scary tale of crime is true!

Soon after, the above story (also added with other fabricated messages) came along with a picture of another woman in saree wearing a tag around her neck. This story that went viral through WhatsApp, Facebook and other social networking sites, in Chennai especially, warned people that the woman is a fraud. Unfortunately, some police officers too thought it was authentic and forwarded it. There also came up stories using the two pictures that said the incidents happened in Hyderabad as well. The woman in saree, an accounts executive attached to an IT firm in Thane, was in fact innocent. Some miscreants lifted the photograph from her Facebook page and fabricated a message that said she was a thief who cheated homemakers pretending to be a saree salesperson. This initial tale took a spin after the LPG fraud story was attached to it. These facts were revealed by a police investigation after the woman sought their help to apprehend those who defamed her by spreading the hoax message.

So the misleading picture aside, like warned by Mahanagar Gas Ltd (MGL), it is better to be smart than sorry when dealing with people claiming to be representatives of LPG companies. Rogues do use such tactics to extract money from unsuspecting consumers and can even get into serious crime.