The Bureau of Immigration (BoI) has issued a lookout circular against Md. Saif of Shaheen Bagh, Delhi, on the request of the economic offences wing (EOW) of Odisha crime branch in connection with a Ponzi scam.

Saif used to run his Ponzi scheme from Dubai. He had duped lakhs of people across India.

A lookout circular is generally issued to alert immigration check posts at airports/ seaports and law enforcement agencies if a wanted person tries to leave the country or arrive in a country from abroad.

The economic offences wing in a media release said: “Md. Saif is one of the main accused in this case and controls this scam from Dubai. An FIR was registered on the complaint of a few (over 800) duped investors of Ganjam district, Odisha. They and lakhs of others (across the country) had invested money in 18football.com with a motive to earn quick money.”

The officials said: “18football.com is a hybrid model of fraud where a Ponzi scheme (multi-level marketing) is run online giving a name of football betting/ gaming application. Investors are promised lucrative benefits like a 3 per cent daily compound return on investment, recharge bonus, referral bonus, extra bonus on the earnings of the downline members, salary bonus, daily withdrawal option etc.”

According to the officials, the investors need to create an account with 18football. com either by application or through an offline referral link and are being asked to bet money on some football matches as prescribed on the website or in the app.

To promote and lure people, the fraudsters were also taking up promotional activities such as social work and charity in the rural areas.