On August 7, Garima Upadhyay logged into her social media account while sipping her Sunday morning tea. She noticed a post she was tagged in about a fundraiser campaign for a child suffering from cancer. Garima, who works as a manager in a reputed import-export firm, donated Rs 5,000/- and Retweeted the campaigning urging her small but close-knit circle on social media to help the child.
One of her friends, Abhishek, noticed the post and raised red flags as the medical documents attached to the campaign looked dubious. When Garima called the hospital numbers, they were disconnected. Upon little research about the doctor who signed the documents, she got his number. The doctor informed her that he was no longer associated with the said hospital and left the institute five years ago. Though Garima took immediate action, thanks to Abhishek, and got her money back, the case is not the same for the donors.
The story mentioned above is based on true events, though the names have been changed. The scams happening on fundraising platforms are very real and may have much deeper consequences than petty crimes. Donating without verifying is one of the most common mistakes donors make on fundraising platforms like Ketto, Milaap, and others. There are countless such allegedly fake fundraisers on these platforms that collect small amounts and vanish without leaving a trace. Every now and then, they use photographs from Google and other fundraisers to create fake fundraisers and collect money from innocent and technologically-less learned netizens.
A doctor issued a warning about the fake fundraiser on Twitter
On August 22, Dr Alok Gupta raised the alarm about an alleged fraud fundraiser running on Ketto. He wrote, “Dear all. This is a *warning message*. This person has photo-shopped my estimate letter given to a patient and started a *FRAUD fundraiser* at Ketto. Please beware of such frauds.” Dr Gupta published the tweet on behalf of Dr Prachi Jain, who is a Pediatric Oncologist at Max Hospital, Vaishali, and Patparganj.
Dear all. This is a *warning message*. This person has photo-shoped my estimate letter given to a patient and started a *FRAUD fundraiser* at Ketto. Please beware of such frauds.
— Dr Alok Gupta (@alorit) August 22, 2022
Dr Prachi.@ketto #fundraiser @arunbothra @RemaNagarajan @sunilkapoor8 @upima21
@DrManishMishra6 pic.twitter.com/cpD6zRu73p
As Dr Jain is a Pediatric Oncologist, it is obvious that she deals with patients under the age of 18. However, the fraudster who morphed her estimate letter mentioned that her sister for whom he was seeking funds was 24 years old. This would be the first red flag that a donor must look for while checking the authenticity of the fundraiser. Apart from that, the stamp of Dr Jain was also cut from the bottom, which possibly has her number.
Since the expose, either Ketto or the fundraiser creator deleted the fundraiser page from Ketto. We have contacted Ketto about the possible fraud fundraisers on their platform and waiting for their reply. Meanwhile, we looked on Twitter to see if Ketto has published any warning for its users about the same, but we could not find any.
Fundraiser scams on Milaap
Ketto is not the only platform that is facing the problem of fake and fraudulent fundraisers. Another popular fundraising platform Milaap is also facing criticism for a large number of ongoing scams. Dr Prashant Mishra raised the issue on Twitter recently. On August 20, he pointed out that fundraisers on Milaap were dubious, and they were seeking more money than required for the treatment.
In one of the screenshots he shared, the campaign raised Rs 22,32,000 while the required amount was Rs 10,00,000. However, the doctor said the cost of the treatment for renal calculi Rt was only between Rs 10 lakh to 15 lakh.
I don’t know anything about cost related to kidney stone but I heard Renal transplant is done between 10-15 lac and here for only kidney stone 10 lac demand was raised and amount raised was 22 lac . pic.twitter.com/71bMGoIT6M
— Dr Prashant Mishra (@drprashantmish6) August 20, 2022
Interestingly, in another screenshot he shared, the amount raised was exactly the same Rs 22,32,000, while the disease and requested amount was different.
Now Liver transplant can be done in 25-35 lac I think but here money demand was 200000 for something related to Gall bladder and fund raised around 33 lac , If it is Gall bladder removal surgery than it can’t be more then 2-2.5 lac . pic.twitter.com/0eV6occk9T
— Dr Prashant Mishra (@drprashantmish6) August 20, 2022
He further shared another screenshot of a campaign seeking Rs 10 lakh for renal calculi Rt, just like the first campaign.
Earlier, Dr Mishra had shared more screenshots where high amounts were collected, but the campaign completely disappeared from the platform. Generally, these platforms should close the campaign and stop the collection of payments once the target has been achieved, but deletion of the pages raises doubts about the authenticity of these platforms and moreover raises questions if any illegal activity has been happening on these platforms.
Following the questions raised on Milaap, the platform issued a statement on August 21 where they washed their hands from any wrongful activities on the platform and said they “try to confirm the credential and genuineness” of the campaign before publishing it. However, things are not likely to get verified as they claim to be.
Our statement on the recent campaigns reported on Twitter. pic.twitter.com/74PBkZ4CQJ
— Milaap (@milaapdotorg) August 21, 2022
Twitter user The Hawk Eye also raised questions on the campaign where Rs 20 lakhs were sought, but Rs 33 lakhs were raised instead. The platform had a stamp on it that it was a genuine campaign. The patient named Sharmin was suffering from a “Gall Bladder.” Gall Bladder what? It is not a disease in itself, but anyway.
Crowdfunding target ₹20L.
— The Hawk Eye (@thehawkeyex) August 20, 2022
Raised ₹33.48L by just 6 donors entries.
₹10L by anonymous & ₹20L by fundraiser self, rest is ‘impact user’!
All for ‘Gall Bladder treatment’.
Milaap tagged ‘fundraiser is genuine’.
What’s happening @milaapdotorg?@IncomeTaxIndia @MahaCyber1 FYI pic.twitter.com/U5UYcKENd8
Now coming to the amount that it had raised. A total of Rs 33 lakh came only from 6 supporters, which is highly unlikely. Sharmin himself donated Rs 10,00,000. An anonymous user, yes… you read it right, an anonymous user donated another Rs 10 lakh, and Milaap being a good samaritan, matched three payments and contributed Rs 1,16,000 thrice.
In reply to the said campaign, Milaap said the campaigns were created recently, and it appeared that contributions came from a close circle of the campaigner to “maximize the benefit from matching donations” that Milaap donates for campaigns to “encourage” other donors. The campaigns, according to Milaap, were paused, and the donations were reversed.
The alleged fundraiser fraud by Rana Ayyub
This is not the first time questions have been raised over fundraising campaigns. Alleged journalist and Washington Post columnist Rana Ayyub has been accused of raising funds in the name of Covid and allegedly using the money for personal use. The case against Ayyub is under investigation by the Enforcement Directorate, and a plea is being heard in Delhi High Court filed by Ayyub, where she has sought the release of the funds that ED had attached during the investigation. Ayyub was also stopped by the authorities from travelling abroad because of the ongoing case, but a Delhi Court allowed her to travel.
