Mumbai: Man nabbed for duping garment trader

City Crime Branch sleuths on Thursday arrested a 53-year-old man who allegedly duped a female garment trader from Andheri to the tune of Rs 76 lakh on the pretext of helping her to solve a land dispute.

The arrested person has been identified as Raju Tiwari, a resident of Versova.

According to the police, complainant (name withheld on police's request) is an Oshiwara resident and is into garment trading. The victim has a plot in Chakala, but since the tax was not paid on the said property since past many years, the said property was in government's custody since 2007.

"Tiwari who was known to the victim had lured her that he could get her property back and took Rs 16 lakh from the victim. However, Tiwari could not live up to his promise after which victim kept on demanding her money from Tiwari," said a police officer.

On March 10, 2016, when the victim was in Frankfurt, Germany, Tiwari contacted her and sought a financial help of Rs 60 lakh urgently. "Tiwari promised victim to return the money by evening that day. Victim then contacted her friend in Andheri and got Rs 60 lakh delivered to Tiwari," said the officer.

Later Tiwari claimed that one Piyush alias Kumar took the money from his possession and fled, police said.

The victim then got an FIR lodged at Andheri police station on April 06, this year, and the case was later transferred to Property Cell of Crime Branch.