HYDERABAD: More than 140 prospective brides and grooms were tricked by a woman who ran a marriage bureau here. V Saritha had set up ‘Srirasthu’ marriage bureau at Amberpet, a year ago.
She started downloading photos of handsome men and pretty looking women from matrimonial websites and gave them attractive fake names and designations.
Interestingly, Saritha used to give the prospective brides and grooms genuine phone numbers of persons in photos.
When they called the numbers to find if they could find man or woman of their life, either they were turned down for not meeting their expectations or the contact numbers were not valid.
According to police, her agenda was to collect registration fee based on economic condition of her ‘prey’. Saritha made around Rs 5 lakh by cheating people.
“She used to invite proposals from prospective grooms and brides by publishing advertisements in newspapers every Sunday. She gave ads stating brides and grooms from certain caste can contact on phone numbers and address, which belonged to her.
When contacted, she used to collect registration fee between Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000 based on the financial position of the people,” said a police official.
“Cases under IPC Section 420 (Cheating)have been registered against the accused,” said
T Prabhakar Rao, joint police commissioner, Central Crime Station, Hyderabad.