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Journalism of Courage
“You seem to be a religious person,” a man told a 72-year-old retired teacher he approached on a busy street in Balewadi.
Under the pretext of making a donation to a nearby temple in memory of his mother, a man allegedly deceived a 72-year-old person into handing his gold ring worth Rs 80,000 to the former on Friday.
A First Information Report in the case was registered by the 72-year-old man, who retired from being a teacher few years ago and has been living with his son’s family in Pune.
The incident took place on Friday afternoon on a busy street near Dasara Chowk in Balewadi. When the victim was returning home after buying some fruit, an unknown man approached him.
According to the FIR, the man said to the victim in Marathi, “You seem to be a religious person. I want to make a donation to a temple here in the memory of my mother.”
The man then started forcibly hand over a bag to the victim saying it had Rs 5,000 and some flowers. The complainant refused to take the bag and asked the man to go to the temple himself and make the donation.
The man told the victim that since death had taken place in his family recently, he could not step foot in a temple as per his beliefs. The complainant reluctantly agreed. The man however asked the victim to remove his gold ring, put it in a small plastic bag and that the latter should keep it with himself. Thee man told the victim to do this as it was important for the donation ritual.
As the complainant walked towards a nearby temple, he checked the bag. He found out it had some flowers and stones in it and that the small plastic bag in which he had kept his ring was gone. The complainant soon realised that the man had tricked him into giving him the gold ring. The complainant searched for the suspect in the area but could not locate him. He later approached the police and an FIR was registered on Friday evening.
“In this case, the suspect used an unusual pretext of making a donation to the temple in order to deceive the victim. But this modus operandi of tricking someone into confidence closely resembles the numerous street impersonation cases reported in the past. We have launched a probe in the case and a team is looking at the CCTV cameras in the area,” an officer said.
Pune, Pimpri Chinchwad and Pune Rural police have in the recent past reported several incidents, in which elderly women were tricked into giving away their gold ornaments by fraudsters who duped them on the pretext of handing out gifts of sarees and cash because “their employer has been blessed with a son after a long wait”.
Police have reported several cases in which people, especially elderly unsuspecting men and women, have been targeted by fraudsters posing as cops and were asked to remove their ornaments telling them crime was committed in the area and police checking was underway.
