Showroom duo clicks pics of two teenaged girls and circulates them

A salesperson at a cellphone store who conned two girls into getting their pictures clicked claiming it was standard procedure has landed behind bars after it was discovered that the photos were being circulated on WhatsApp and Facebook. His accomplice, Ashok, also surrendered before the cops on Tuesday evening.

Munawar Pasha, a builder and the father of one of the girls, called the bluff of the youths, who are employed at Univercell, a cellphone showroom. Outraged by the audacity of the perverts, Pasha tracked down one of the youths and handed him over to the police. The youth, identified as Pradeep, and aged around 23 years, has been arrested under the Information Technology (IT) Act.

The incident allegedly took place on June 19 when 18-year-old Mubina (name changed) went along with her dad, uncle Zakir Khan and cousin sister to buy cellphones.

The family says the salespersons were courteous throughout the interaction, giving no reason for doubt. They bought two cell phones worth Rs 46,300 and Rs 39,300 for the two girls. While the girls were busy checking out their new gadgets, one of the salesmen asked them to pose with the cellphones. Munawar and Zakir questioned the duo, but the girls complied after being told it was the store’s standard procedure to maintain customer records. For added effect, the two youths threw in the promise of a free gift.

The two then went on to click pictures from their individual cellphones.

Speaking to Bangalore Mirror, Munawar said, “The boys said it was to select customers for the purpose of giving away gifts and maintaining records. Some time later, I was shocked to learn my daughter’s photo had been circulated to several people on WhatsApp.”

He says on Monday evening, his daughter got her own photo on WhatsApp from a friend. “My daughter immediately brought it to my notice. We realised it had been clicked in the showroom.”

Munawar says he decided to act fast. “I went to the showroom around 2.30 pm on Tuesday and caught Pradeep. I called the police and handed him over.”

Another salesman identified as Ashok, who was his accomplice, is at large and police are looking for him. After preliminary inquiry, police said Pradeep looks after product sales. He and Ashok clicked the girls’ photos and circulated them.

Not only were they circulated, but people had also started misusing the photos. Police found one person had been using the girls’ photo as his profile picture, while another had merged his picture with that of the girls through photo editing.

Pradeep had allegedly created a WhatsApp group and sent the photos to the group members. The chain of ‘forwards’ ended in Mubina herself getting her photo.

Pradeep reportedly told the police he had uploaded the photo to share their sales skills and to promote sales.

However, the showroom manager told the police they did not have any such policy of taking customers’ pictures. He claimed they had no clue about the two youths’ click tricks and told the police to take action against the duo.