Three African nationals along with an Indian woman have been arrested by Special Cell of Delhi Police for allegedly cheating prospective brides through popular matrimonial websites.
Police said Mohan, showing himself as an orthopaedic surgeon working with the United Nations and currently in Iraq on an assignment, had expressed interest to the victim for a matrimonial alliance.
The victim who is also a doctor from Hyderabad told the police that after a month of interacting with him over the net, she was convinced that he was the one she was destined to marry. She hadn’t anticipated in her wildest dreams what was in store.
Mohan who pretended to be a UK citizen of Indian origin used to call her from UK and Indian numbers, which he used to tell as being on International roaming. He also used to talk to her over Viber.
After gaining trust of the victim, Mohan told the woman that his assignment was about to complete and he would be in India by April, and will come to her house and will meet her parents.
The accused claimed that the Iraqi government had gifted him some jewellery and gold as an appreciation for an anti-terrorist operation. He offered to send the jewellery, medical equipment and about Rs 5 crore to her address.
The parcel has to reach India on April 7 and the victim received a call from a “customs inspector” stating that she had to pay customs clearance fee for the parcel which was worth several crores. She spoke about it to Mohan over phone and he asked her to pay the fee and assured her that he would return her money upon arrival.
Police said that after this amount was paid, the person posing as customs inspector demanded more money on various grounds like “Money Laundering clearance, Anti-Terrorist Funding clearance” for which the victim kept on borrowing money from others and also availed loans and paid the amounts in various bank accounts stated to be belonging to custom agents as told by Mohan.
After depositing over Rs 48,00,000, the victim called the accused to inform him about the payment but found his number switched off. She then enquired with airport officials and found out that there was no parcel in her name pending customs clearance. Woman then realized that she was being cheated and got an FIR lodged at Cyber Crime Police Station of Hyderabad.
According to police there is a gang of robbers who are cheating the women by creating and operating fictitious profiles, posing themselves as wealthy NRIs working in highly remunerative professions abroad.