Banda: The Uttar Pradesh police have busted a huge marriage scam and arrested four accused including two women, who allegedly tricked several single men into marrying a woman and stole money and jewellery from their homes. The accused was arrested in UP’s Banda district on Wednesday and is being interrogated by the police.

A senior police official identified the accused as Poonam, Sanjana Gupta, Vimalesh Verma and Dharmendra Prajapati. The police are interrogating the accused to ascertain the facts about how many victims they conned before their arrest and who else are there in their gang.

The UP police said that Poonam would act as the bride and Sanjana Gupta would pretend to be her mother. Vimalesh Verma and Dharmendra Prajapati, the two men, would find targets and introduce them to Poonam. They would ask the men to pay about Rs 1.5 lakh for arranging a marriage. After a simple court wedding, Poonam would visit the groom’s home.

Once at the victim’s house, Poonam used to steal cash and jewellery before running away.

According to the police, the gang is said to have committed six similar crimes before targeting Shankar Upadhyay, who was single and looking for a match. He was approached by Vimalesh, who promised to find him a bride if he paid Rs 1.5 lakh. He agreed and was taken to a court where he met Poonam. They once again asked for the money, but Upadhyay grew suspicious. He asked for their Aadhaar cards and noticed something was doubtful.

“I suspected something was wrong when they kept pushing me to marry. When I refused, they threatened to harm me and frame me in false cases. I decided to leave,” Upadhyay told police.

Additional Police Superintendent of Banda, Shiv Raj confirmed that after Shankar Upadhyay filed a complaint, the police quickly took action. “We alerted our teams and arrested four people, including two women.” He said that they were involved in cheating on single men by promising them to find a bride for them.

Further investigation into the case is being carried out.