A scammer claiming to be New Zealand wicketkeeper-batter Devon Conway called him shortly after the 2025 Indian Premier League and wanted Virat Kohli's number, according to veteran spinner Ravichandran Ashwin.
This occurred amid rumors that AB de Villiers and Kohli had called two children regarding Rajat Patidar's unaccounted-for number. Once owned by Patidar, the SIM card was soon being used by an astonished Manish Bisi to answer calls from de Villiers and Kohli.
After installing WhatsApp, Manish and his companion Khemraj initially believed that the profile image of Royal Challengers Bengaluru captain Patidar was a system error, but it quickly became as real as the voices on the other end of the phone line.
When callers claimed to be Yash Dayal, de Villiers, and Kohli, Manish and Khemraj were quickly drawn into a world of disbelief. Despite their best efforts to stay realistic, they believed that the callers were all playing a sophisticated practical joke on them.
It was only later, when Rajat Patidar contacted them and relayed that he had reported this to police, that Manish and Khemraj believed that the number they had was really of the RCB captain.
Speaking about the story on his YouTube channel, Ashwin shared a similar experience of his own.
“A guy messaged me after IPL 2025 ended, saying he was Conway and went, ‘Hi buddy, how are you?’ I responded, and we had a full-fledged conversation as I asked him to stay in touch and promised that I would watch him play in MLC," Ashwin hilariously narrated on his YouTube channel.
“Then he said, ‘I missed Virat’s number; can you share it?’ I wondered why he was asking for Kohli’s number, but I couldn’t ask him that since I didn’t want Conway to misunderstand.
What I did was send him another number, saying it was Virat’s. Then he said, ‘I missed a few more numbers.’ When I asked who else, he said Rohit Sharma and MS Dhoni. I understood this was a prank. Then I asked him, ‘I gave you a bat this year; how is it?’ He said, ‘The bat is amazing,’ but I never gave Conway a bat. He lied, and I blocked him," Ashwin added.
R Ashwin has reportedly asked for his release from the CSK franchise ahead of the IPL 2026 auction and might also step down from his role in the CSK academy as well.
