The number of wives in the list of a 66-year-old man of Odisha, who married middle-aged, educated, and well-to-do women of various states, increased to 17 with three more cases coming to the fore, a police officer said on Wednesday.
A student from Odisha’s Jagatsinghpur district also alleged that the fake doctor had duped him of Rs 18 lakh after assuring him a seat in a medical college in the state.
According to police, he duped his wives, four of whom live in Odisha, three in Delhi, three in Assam, two each in Madhya Pradesh and Punjab, and one each in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh, of lakhs of rupees before moving on to greener pastures. The sexagenarian Ramesh Chandra Swain, who acquired different names like Dr Bibhu Prakash Swain and Dr Ramani Ranjan Swain, is from a coastal village in Odisha’s Kendrapara district.
Swain was an expert in persuading women and lured college teachers, even hard-boiled policewomen and captious lawyers, as he went about striking middle-aged women desperate for companionship with cupid’s arrow. He, however, rejected the accusations. Swain asserted while being escorted to the court. Swain befriended women on matrimonial websites and deftly concealed his matrimonial status.