Man who cheated over 500 women on dating apps, online held

With the arrest of a 35-year-old man from West Bengal this week, Delhi Police say, they have finally ended the ‘streak’ of a swindler who cheated over 500 women across dating apps, matrimonial websites, and social media in the last seven years — without meeting them once

With the arrest of a 35-year-old man from West Bengal this week, Delhi Police say, they have finally ended the ‘streak’ of a swindler who cheated over 500 women across dating apps, matrimonial websites, and social media in the last seven years — without meeting them once. In total, police said, he had more than 30 active social media accounts where he posed as everything from a doctor and film producer to a businessman.

Police said they arrested the accused, Anand Kumar, from 24 Parganas region on Tuesday (Photo for representation)

Police said they arrested the accused, Anand Kumar, from 24 Parganas region on Tuesday. He had nine gold jewellery pieces and ₹2 crores across seven betting app accounts, where he would receive the money to avoid detection. He used this money buy gold and play online games.

He allegedly targeted “rich-looking” women from metro cities, said inspector Pravesh Kaushik. He added that Kumar had been previously arrested in two cases in Delhi and Ghaziabad, but was released.

He finally came under police’s radar again in March after a woman from south Delhi said she had been cheated of ₹7 lakh by a doctor named Vaibhav Arora.

“They matched on a dating application. The accused promised to marry her,” said DCP (southwest) Amit Goel. Kumar then fabricated stories about serious medical emergencies and financial losses in business, and requested financial assistance. Believing his claims, the woman transferred the money.

“When she later asked for the money, he faked his death with the help of his friend ‘Anand’, a fake identity he had introduced to her earlier,” the DCP added.

Police said the investigation started from digital footprints on the meta apps and IP logs.They then started tracking his WhatsApp accounts and found he was active in 24 Parganas region.

Kumar used photos of less well-known influencers to dupe the women. A team, led by Kaushik, found in his possession eight SIM cards and nearly 2 GB of data — photos and videos — taken from accounts of Indian influencers.

“He was very careful though. He only used photos of lesser known influencers or influencers who had a following of less than 50,000. He picked out photos of travel and lifestyle influencers who posted about their car collection, trips and luxurious vacations,” said an official aware of the investigation.

Using these photos, he made more than five Instagram accounts, eight WhatsApp accounts and two accounts on each dating app. “He also used some doctors’ dating app to target female doctors,” said the official.

“He was held in 2019 but that was one case in south Delhi. In 2023, he was arrested again in Ghaziabad he was held but soon released,” said the DCP.

“After gaining the confidence of the victims, he created false situations such as financial crises, medical emergencies, business losses or urgent family needs to solicit money. In several cases, he promised marriage or professional opportunities such as modelling assignments. The accused also blackmailed some of the victims by using their private photos,” added the DCP.