BHAWANIPATNA: Kalahandi Police busted a fake marriage racket and arrested four persons, including a woman who allegedly cheated people by marrying them with different identities.The 32-year-old woman identified as Ellee Mahanta, resident of Jalda in Sundargarh district, played a key role along with associates Birbal Sharma (60), Mina Gupta (51) and Sraban Soni (36). Kalahandi SP Saravana Vivek said the four ran a racket to mint money from gullible persons.
After Ellee’s first husband died, she married one Rajendra Das but was staying with her relatives at Sarangarh in Chhattisgarh. In June last year, Birbal gave a marriage proposal to Bikash Jain, the complainant who hails from Kalahandi’s Risida, with Ellee.
Bikash’s family agreed to the proposal and visited Sarangarh along with Birbal and Sraban to finalise the marriage. On June 17, Birbal came to Bikash’s house and asked for `4 lakh as his fees for mediation.
On June 27, the marriage was solemnised between Bikash and Ellee at Jain Bhawan in Kesinga following which Birbal was paid `4 lakh. However, some days after the marriage, Ellee’s behaviour became suspicious and Bikash came to know that the woman had previously cheated several persons in a similar way.
The SP said, the woman first prepared a fake Aadhaar card in the name of Sindhumati Munda in 2013. She again kept changing her name to Ellee Mahanta in 2018, Mamata Agrawal and finally Mamata Jain in 2020 before marrying Bikash. Police seized the four fake Aadhaar cards used by Ellee.