World's cheapest smartphone boss held

The former managing director of a little-known Indian company that claimed to be selling the world's cheapest smartphone has been arrested for fraud, police said yesterday.

Mohit Goel, boss of the domestic handset maker Ringing Bells, was taken into custody in Ghaziabad late Thursday after a distributor complained it had not received phones worth 1.6 million rupees (around $24,000).

Ayam Enterprises said it had paid 3 million rupees ($45,000) after Goel persuaded it to distribute the Freedom 251 smartphone in November 2015 but only received 1.4 million rupees' worth. Deputy superintendent of police Manish Kumar Mishra said Goel had been arrested in Ghaziabad.