CoinDCX Co-Founders Walk Free as Court Rules Scammer Was Just a Bad Impersonator

A Thane magistrate decided to grant bail to CoinDCX co-founders Sumit Surendra Gupta and Niraj Ashok Khandelwal, basically concluding the case against them had less substance than a shitcoin whitepaper. The judge saw no prima facie evidence in a complaint about a 71 lakh-rupee (≈$75,000) scam tied to a fake platform impersonating the real exchange.

The original complaint claimed the founders pulled a fast one via a knock-off site, coindcx.pro. The judge, however, pointed out that the investigating officer didn't object, the founders weren't even in Mumbra when the alleged digital heist went down, and the person who filed the complaint admitted someone else was pretending to be the accused—a classic case of identity theft, not founder-led shenanigans.

Not missing a beat, CoinDCX took to X to state the court proceedings confirm a "third-party impersonation" story, adding that the fraudulent domain has about as much connection to the company as a random dogecoin meme has to the Federal Reserve. The company firmly denied any link.

According to the affidavit from the person who filed the complaint, a different accused individual, named Rana, actually paid back the swindled amount. He also confirmed the founders weren't the "crypto bros" he met at a café in Kausa Mumbra. With the whole issue settled amicably between the complainant and the main accused, the court found no signs of evidence-tampering or witness-coercion—surprising exactly no one in crypto, where settlements often happen faster than a memecoin pump.

The two founders were released on bail after posting a 50,000-rupee (≈$530) bond, a sum that wouldn't even cover the gas fees for a major Ethereum transaction these days. Their release came with the standard condition to cooperate with the ongoing investigation and any future trial proceedings.

Seizing the moment for some much-needed public service, CoinDCX highlighted the incident as a warning about the increasing wave of impersonation and phishing scams targeting big names in India's financial and crypto scenes. The exchange urged users to double-check URLs like their portfolio depends on it and to interact only with its official platform and social media handles, because in this game, not every ".pro" domain is a professional.