BENGALURU: A 24-year-old woman who asked a so-called astrologer whether hers would be a love or arranged marriage has ended up losing nearly Rs 5.9 lakh.
The crook, who identified himself as Vijay Kumar, told the woman hers would be a love marriage but she had some astrological issues in her horoscope, which he could fix with special pujas. He collected money from her for the same.
According to the complaint filed by Priya (name changed), a resident of Electronics City and a private firm employee, she found an account named ‘splno1indianastrologer’ on Instagram on Jan 5. The profile had a photo of Aghori baba and the user claimed to be an ‘expert astrologer’.
Priya messaged the person, who introduced himself as Vijay Kumar and shared his mobile number (9929677652), asking her to send him a WhatsApp message with her name and date of birth to check her horoscope. After the woman shared the same, he told her she would have a love marriage.
He later told her about the need to perform a puja that would cost Rs 1,820. Since it was not a big sum, Priya readily agreed to pay. He asked for the payment to be made through a digital payment app.
Thereafter, he started concocting one story after another about her marital life and future, fleecing money on the pretext of conducting a series of pujas. After she paid him nearly Rs 6 lakh, he started asking for more money. She realised he was taking advantage of her and refused to pay him any further, demanding that he return what she had already given him.
While he returned around Rs 13,000, Kumar said if she forced him to pay any more, he would kill himself and name her in his suicide note. After a few days, a person named Prashant called her and introduced himself as an advocate. He told her Kumar was ready to kill himself as she was forcing him to return the money even after he had performed many pujas on her behalf. Priya subsequently approached the cops.
A senior police officer said the entire fraud appears to be the handiwork of cybercrooks, with no astrologer or advocate involved. Electronics City police have taken up a case under the Information Technology Act and BNS Section 318 (cheating).
