Noida: A Nigerian national was arrested in Uttar Pradesh’s Noida city for allegedly duping women by contacting them through matrimonial sites using fake identities, the police on Friday said.
A police official said the 37-year-old accused had come to India in 2018 on a medical visa and was staying in Greater Noida on rent, PTI reported.
The police official added that the man was arrested by the Noida unit of the UP Cyber Cell.
The police said Oshitor Churchill Paul, the accused, would befriend women through matrimonial websites identifying himself as an NRI (non-resident Indian) and gain their confidence by promising to marry them.
The police further said he would then trap women by saying he has sent expensive gifts and cash in foreign currency but they are stuck with the Customs Department at the airport.
The police added in a statement that he would tell women that gifts, however, would be released after payment of some fees.
Paul was helped by his wife Josalyn, an Indian national from Goa, in his fraudulent act.
According to police, they had got married in a church in Delhi in 2014.
The Nigerian national has so far, as per the Cyber Cell estimates, duped his victims of at least Rs 50 crore.
The police in a statement said that they have also traced a farmhouse that Paul purchased near Pune in his wife’s name.
His arrest came after an FIR was lodged on Wednesday on the complaint of a Noida-based woman.
The woman, who alleged cyber fraud of Rs 1.07 lakh with her by a man identifying himself as an NRI Yogesh Jain, had got in touch with him through a matrimony website and after several conversations.
The police said the man told her that he has come to India on a vacation but the officials at the airport have caught him with 50,000 pounds in cash.
The Cyber Cell, as per the police, traced the conman to Greater Noida and arrested him on Friday after electronic evidence suggested his role in the fraud.