Online marriage frauds

A woman and her son, who came to Chennai in search of a prospective bride, were robbed by two men claiming to be marriage brokers after giving them food laced with a substance that made them unconscious.

Sources with the Velachery police said Manoj Devendran (27) and his mother Lakshmi Bai (50) from Hyderabad came to the city by air on Friday after responding to an online advertisement asking for prospective grooms placed by the suspects.

“The victims contacted the phone number given in the ad placed by the suspects, who later mailed them a photograph of some junior cine artist. Taking it for real, the woman and the son came to Chennai to meet the girl,” said an investigating officer.

One suspect, who identified himself as Badrinath, received them in Chennai on Friday along with his aide and made them stay in a service apartment in Velachery.

The duo gave them a dinner reportedly mixing a substance which made them unconscious. They woke up to realise that their bag with a necklace was missing, the officer added.

Devendran lodged a complaint with the Velachery police who have registered a case and launched a hunt for the duo.

One held on charges of marriage fraud

ALAPPUZHA: A 52-year-old man, who cheated nine women into marrying him, was arrested by the Alappuzha South Police here on charges of marriage fraud on Wednesday.

The accused, Thomson alias Tony alias Sukumaran, used to advertise himself as a prospective groom in vernacular newspapers as a 39-year-old man working with an insurance company in the Middle East.

He had thus married a nurse, a teacher and a government employee as well among the nine marriages he had managed.

However, the ninth wedding, one with a 26-year-old woman at Kuthirapanthi finally put an end to his adventures after neighbours grew suspicious of his behaviour and the marriage which was an “unusually very low-key affair”, according to the police.

The neighbours alerted the police, who questioned Thomson, who has confessed his fraud, police said.

( The Hindu )

Online Marriage Fraud Is Booming In India, pose as NRI
One Liaquat who allegedly cheated more than fifty women into marriage

Cyber frauds worry matrimonial business
Kamal Narayan
PTI

With the online match making getting popular in the country, increasing number of cyber duping cases has become the matter of great concern to the matrimonial web sites who plead helplessness beyond a point in checking the menace.

The matrimonial sites came under scanner after the arrest of one Liaquat who allegedly cheated more than fifty women into marriage in Chennai in recently. He advertised himself as a UK-based Indian engineer looking for a bride in an online marriage portal. "We are cautious about the increasing misuse of matrimonial web sites, this has forced us to undertake some additional precautionary measures as verifying the phone numbers and residence addresses of each user and maintaining are cord of family background," says Murugavel Janakiraman of BharatMatrimony.Com.

Matrimonial web sites have become the preferred option for the soul mate seekers in the country and abroad, according to an online survey. It is a huge business and the websites don't want to let their clients down by the acts some criminal minded people who use the sites pervertedly. Meanwhile, the alarming growth of cyber crime poses threat to the society as their global growth rate is purportedly four per cent per week.

Vivek Sood, an expert of Criminal and Cyber Law, says cyber crime is a menace for the global society as it jumps the geographical boundaries speedily and its perpetrators are almost invisible as there are rare chances to catch them.

According to Sood, the numbers of cyber crime increased from 640 in year 1993 to 2,82,000 cases in year 2000.

In a bid to remove the fear of their users, and to convince them for safety, one of the major online match making service provider in the country, SimplyMarry.com says they use the robust engine to support security of all the particulars, photos, contact details, personal information, and any fact about users.

Murugavel whose BharatMatrimony.com has recently completed its ten years of functioning, felt that a Internet based matrimonial service provider can't go beyond a proper limit in carrying out security checks, so it is equally crucial for the users to remain vigilant.

"Conduct a proper verification check, involve your parents and relatives, avoid solitary meetings and never share much of your personal information while proceeding with online match seeking," suggests Murugavel.

The Matrimonial market has registered a boom in India as its ongoing fiscal year business estimates around 140 crores after taking a giant leap from 70-80 crores in last year. It has evolved into a mature and popular service provider as twelve million users which constitute about half of the urban online users undertake matrimony search, an online survey reveals.

The survey, conducted by JustConsult, an online research agency, claims that matrimonial search is the second largest gainer among online activities as it has registered growth of 33 per cent during the last year only.

Increasing popularity of matrimonial search among the match seekers has made the matrimonial market more competitive as the number of these portals increasing after every day.

"We are metro-centric site that caters to soul mate seekers of India and the NRI population. It is for, simple, safer and uncomplicated soul mate search that provides ideal matches very fast," says the official Spokesperson for SimplyMarry.com.

Courtesy: http://www.nriinternet.com

Guidelines to avoid online marriage fraud

Contact only reliable matrimony services
Conduct proper verification and background check up
Check up the phone numbers and residence address
Do not share your personal information while proceeding
Try to involve parents and relatives
Always be vigilant.
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