Thane, Nov 7 (PTI) The Navi Mumbai police have arrested a 35-year-old chartered accountant from Pune for allegedly cheating people of lakhs through 'task' fraud, an official said on Tuesday.

The police apprehended Akash Umesh Pandey, a chartered accountant with a private firm, from Lohegaon in Pune on November 4 in a case registered against him under section 420 (cheating) and other relevant provisions of the Indian Penal Code and Information Technology Act, senior inspector Gajanan Kadam of the cyber police station said.

The police had received a complaint from a Navi Mumbai resident who allegedly lost Rs 17 lakh after performing various tasks online as instructed by the accused between August 9 and 14, he said.

The police traced the bank account in which the money was deposited and the phone number connected to the transactions. The police froze the bank accounts and zeroed in on the accused in Pune, the official said.

Pandey, along with his associates in Delhi, was involved in four similar offences in Maharashtra and had 21 cyber cases in other states, he said.

The cyber police have frozen Rs 5.9 lakh deposited in different bank accounts operated by the arrested accused, the official said. PTI COR ARU