KOCHI: The police have launched a detailed probe into the incident in which a husband and a wife allegedly duped a finance professional in the city of Rs 60.65 lakh by promising to set up a textile fashion store that would yield good returns.
The accused are Kamal Raj Manickath, 39, of Anagmaly and his wife Lakshmi Menon, 37, the director of Salks Designs Pvt Ltd in Panampilly Nagar. The South police had registered a case on the finance professional’s complaint.
“Kamal Raj, a fashion designer and entrepreneur, claimed to be the founder and partner of the firm ‘Soucika Couture LLP’ based in Bengaluru. He and his wife made the complainant believe that if he took franchise of the textile showroom of the business run by the accused, he would get high returns,” said a police official.
The duo tricked the complainant into believing that they would launch the new firm in Kochi and collected Rs 60.65 lakh from him over three years. They did not keep the promise and diverted his money, said the official.
A court that had dismissed the couple’s anticipatory bail pleas had observed that the case against them was about a peculiar and complex mode of cheating and misappropriation as a continuous offence running for three years.