A Bengaluru-based software engineer allegedly fell victim to a scam on a dating website and was duped of ₹59.72 lakh.
After he lodged a complaint with the cybercrime ceel, the police on Tuesday arrested a Kolkata-based couple — Rupali, 38, and Kushan Majumdar, 49 — in connection with the case.
According to the police, the complainant. Srinath. got to know Rupali (who introduced herself as Arpitha, a teacher) on an online dating site. The woman got in touch with Srinath and they started chatting on messaging service WhatsApp.
She requested him to transfer ₹30,000 to her account telling him that her father was admitted to a hospital in Kolkata. She repeatedly requested him to transfer more money, which all added up to ₹59.72 lakh over six months, the complainant said.
A team led by the DGP, CID verified the transaction details and found out that the woman was duping people in collusion with her husband. The woman and her husband — B.Com. graduates — did not have a steady source of income since 2009.
Kushan earlier worked as a salesman. He also dabbled as an actor in Bengali serials, worked as a scriptwriter and as a freelancer in local media publications.
The police said that the couple had hatched a plan to dupe men online. Rupali would log in to the website to trap men. She would use photos of models as her profile photo.
The CID, who are investigating the case, have seized ₹44,000, two mobile phones and bank passbooks from the couple. Further investigations are under way.