31-year-old serial offender held for duping at least four women

Police said that Kunal Arora’s claim of being an MBA is being verified, and that he is not a CA or a banker. He runs a meat shop in Dwarka

There was no wedding – no temple ceremony, not even a court marriage. But there was a sheet of paper, an affidavit that purportedly announced that a 29-year-old woman, who is a resident of Delhi and Kunal Arora, 31, a sweet-talking MBA, were married.

Based on the woman’s statement, a case under sections 420 (cheating) and 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was registered against Kunal Arora. (Representational image)

In a bid to chase marital bliss, the woman sold her 25 square yard house in south-west Delhi’s Sagarpur for a few lakhs, so that a new house could be purchased for the couple, where they would live with Arora’s family.

Arora allegedly pocketed the money. Then, there was another ₹11 lakh, and some gold jewellery too.

“By the end of 2019, he got all this, started avoiding her. This finally drove her to the women’s cell of the Delhi police. She wanted to file a complaint against her ‘husband’,” said a police investigator, who asked not to be named.

Except Arora was not her husband, and the affidavit he had given her a few years ago – a romantic gesture to prove his undying love for her – was a fake, useless piece of paper.

On February 24 – over a year after an FIR was filed against him at the Kapashera police station – Arora was arrested from a hotel in west Delhi’s Janakpuri for allegedly raping and cheating the 29-year-old woman, said deputy commissioner of police (southwest) Rohit Meena.

Based on the woman’s statement, a case under sections 420 (cheating) and 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was registered against Arora. After this, the woman’s statement before the magistrate was recorded, in which she had alleged that she was also raped by him. Police added section 376 (rape) of the IPC after that.

The arrest has opened a can of worms as the police suspect that Arora defrauded multiple women. “So far, we have found four women, of which two he certainly defrauded. There’s a third woman – a widow – who he was living with in Uttam Nagar. And a fourth woman from Myanmar, who was with him in the hotel at the time of his arrest. We are investigating if he cheated them too,” said a police officer, who asked not to be named.

Police suspect that there are other victims who haven’t come forward as they are “worried about their reputation,” said an investigator, who asked not to be named.

Apart from the woman who sold her house in Sagarpur, another woman – who was his friend from school – lost around ₹2.5 lakh. As per the FIR filed in this case at the Bindapur police station, Arora allegedly took ₹2,42,000 from the woman, who he was due to marry, on the pretext of his ”ailing father who had a ruptured vein in his brain.”

In the FIR, the woman claimed that once he took her money, he started avoiding her, and after much insistence to return the loan, he gave cheques in 2019 that could not be encashed due to “insufficient funds.” The FIR was filed in 2019.

The police investigator said, “He is a good-looking man, fluent in English, and told the women that he was a chartered accountant and a banker. The women said that he spoke very well, was kind, and understood them. He took advantage of their vulnerabilities, earned their trust, and would quickly propose marriage.”

Police said that Arora’s claim of being an MBA is being verified, and that he is not a CA or a banker. He runs a meat shop in Dwarka. “His father works in a grocery store, and his parents are separated. His younger brother lives with their mother and is a CA,” said the investigator.

Police said that while investigating the case, it was found that he had three addresses on record – Uttam Nagar, Subhash Nagar, and Tilak Nagar. “But he wasn’t found at any of the three addresses,” the investigator said.

With the help of a woman he defrauded, police got his latest phone number and tracked him down to the hotel in Janakpuri. “Arora’s location was tracked for two days and on Saturday, he was arrested from a hotel in Janakpuri where he was with a woman, who could have been his latest target,” the officer said.