04 November,2020 08:02 AM IST | Mumbai | Anurag Kamble
Representation. Pic/Istock
A Ghatkopar resident had no idea that a friendship over Tinder would cost him Rs 4.50 lakh till he met the woman in person. A couple of days after meeting her on the dating site, he went to meet her at her Bhiwandi residence, where he was confined by a group of men and women.
They not only transferred money from three of his accounts and used his credit card to shop for jewellery and electronics, but also abused him and threatened to frame him in a fake rape case. After he filed a complaint at the Shanti Nagar police station, an FIR was registered in the matter.
According to the police, complainant Atul (name changed), a 41-year-old Ghatkopar East resident, met the woman - Dipali Jain - online on October 29 and they started chatting. On November 1 when Dipali messaged him again, he asked her whether they could meet. However, Dipali told him that she wasn't well.
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Again on November 2, while chatting Atul asked her whether she was worried about something, to which Dipali said that her online garment business was suffering losses due to the pandemic. Atul, however, offered to help her and they decided to meet at Dipali's flat between 1pm and 4pm. On reaching her house, the duo had a brief conversation about the issues she had been facing in her business and then Atul went to the bathroom to freshen up. In the meantime, he overheard her speaking to someone on her mobile phone. Soon after the doorbell rang and on opening it a woman barged into the house. She started questioning Dipali about Atul.
A police officer said, "Sometime later another woman and two men entered the flat. They started beating and abusing Atul and alleged that he tried to rape Dipali. The men then snatched his mobile phone and wallet and asked him to co-operate with them or else they would hand him over to the police for attempting to rape the woman."
According to Atul's statement, the men transferred R2.32 lakh from three of his accounts to Dipali's account and then used his credit card to shop for jewellery and electronic items worth R2.20 lakh. The women, including Dipali, threatened to frame him in a fake rape case. They also forced him to record a video where he said that he had borrowed money from Dipali, which he returned.
After a while the men came back and returned his wallet and mobile phone after deleting the Tinder app and the chats he had with Dipali. Thereafter, Atul returned to Ghatkopar and narrated the whole incident to his friends, who asked him to register a case against the culprits.
The officer further said, "An offence has been registered under various sections of the IPC. A team has been set up to nab the culprits. We will arrest them soon."
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