CoinDCX co-founders plan next steps after ‘shocking and disheartening’ scam accusation, promise safety infrastructure

Thane police last week arrested Sumit Gupta and Neeraj Khandelwal, two co-founders of cryptocurrency exchange platform CoinDCX, in connection with an alleged incident. ₹71.6 lakh fraud cases. On March 24, the duo was granted bail by the Thane district court, which ruled that prima facie no case was made against them.

Their legal team argued that they were victims of “mistaken identity” and false impersonation. Justice Nilesh Rathod also ruled against Gupta and Khandelwal ₹He asked them for bail of 50,000 each and to cooperate in the investigation.

According to the police, the investigation is ongoing and all efforts are ongoing to capture the other four suspects.

CoinDCX co-founder Sumit Gupta took to social media to post directly about the turn of events, addressing the scam, the arrest, what happened, and what the company is planning next amid the scams and controversy.

‘Shocking and frankly very disheartening’

In a lengthy post on social media platform X (formerly Twitter), Gupta wrote that he wanted to “address what happened to Neeraj and I last week.”

“Of course it was quite shocking for us too, and frankly very disheartening. But today we want to talk about what actually happened and, more importantly, what we’re going to do about it,” he added.

Explaining the chain of events, Gupta said that they were detained by the police on March 21 due to a fraud complaint and were taken to the courthouse 3 days later. “On March 24, a Thane court granted us bail, finding that no prima facie case was made out against us,” he added.

Gupta also claimed that the scam was carried out by impersonators through a fake website “http://coindcx.pro” and had “absolutely no connection with our platform, systems or CoinDCX.”

“No money passed through CoinDCX. No transactions took place on our exchange. The complainant confirmed in court that he did not know us and had never met us. I will be honest: our experience was extremely disturbing. Not because we doubted the facts, but because we knew from the first moment that this had nothing to do with us. But because it makes something painfully clear: the ecosystem in which we operate does not yet have the tools to tell the difference between the people who are building this industry responsibly and the people who are exploiting it,” he said.

Founder says CoinDCX plans to ‘lead change’

Gupta added that this method of fraud through impersonation threatens the brands, names and faces of innocent people and can happen to anyone. Adding that CoinDCX will lead the change, Gupta announced the Digital Suraksha Network (DSN). ₹100 crore commitment from the company, which aims to “build the cybersecurity infrastructure that India’s digital finance ecosystem needs but does not yet have.”

“This is not a crypto problem. This is a problem that occurs in every company with a digital footprint,” he added.

• Creating a 24×7 WhatsApp helpline: Verifying links, platforms and offers before trading is free for everyone, not just CoinDCX users.
• Open Fraud Intelligence API: “We have already documented more than 1,200 fake websites impersonating CoinDCX. This data was in our systems. Not anymore,” Gupta said. He added that the company has created an open API to share this intelligence in real-time and invites every exchange, fintech, bank and digital lender to contribute as a “common immune system for India’s digital finance ecosystem”.
• Cybersecurity Infrastructure for Law Enforcement: The Digital Suraksha Network will fund training programs in blockchain forensics and digital asset tracking for state cybercrime cells.

• “Pre-Transaction Caution”: A nationwide initiative to provide every Indian with the tools to safely participate in digital finance.

“We know that no single company can solve this. Fraud networks are complex, cross-border, and evolving every day. Today, they leverage artificial intelligence, which makes them exponentially harder to catch. But someone needs to start tackling this problem at its root. ₹100 crore is on the table because the ecosystem cannot afford to wait. I implore every platform, every regulator and every Indian participating in digital finance to join us. We want to ensure that anyone starting a startup like us in India can do so with confidence, not fear,” Gupta added.

What is the case against CoinDCX and its founders?

Gupta and Khandelwal were arrested based on an FIR registered at Mumbra police station on March 16. The official said that as per the PTI report, four more persons were also accused of cheating, breach of trust and fraud in the complaint.

The complainant, a 42-year-old insurance consultant from Mumbra, claimed he had been defrauded. ₹71.6 lakh between August 2025 and March 2026 after being duped with the promise of high returns by investing in a firm allegedly associated with the cryptocurrency platform. The complainant was transferred ₹According to the police, an amount of 71,60,015 was deposited through cash and online transactions at different times but no response was received and the funds were allegedly misappropriated.