chief
Prime VIP
Chennai, August 13
A modern Robin Hood, who defrauded religious institutions to the tune of several lakhs of rupees and spent the money to help the poor was arrested here.
R Prakash, a mechanical engineer, hailing from Madurai, in south Tamil Nadu, had cheated a few ashrams and spent the money to help the underprivileged to get education, medical treatment and donated money to NGOs to carry out social work, the police said.
The cyber crime cell of Chennai police arrested him following a complaint by a Chennai-based ashram. The mechanical engineer was brought to the city from Elur, a village in Andhra Pradesh, where he was living with a widow. The 39-year-old graduate, who met the widow with two children had sympathised with her for her pathetic condition and had married her.
According to the police, Prakash decided to take the route to crime after his father was cheated by a self-styled godman in his native town of Madurai. His father Rajagopal lost more than Rs two lakh to the godman who offered to help the family tide over their problems.
The arrested engineer said, "my father who received about Rs 3.5 lakh when he retired from his company as retirement benefits, spent most of it on the godman, hoping that his problems would be solved. But nothing was solved. My father fell and died within six months. My mother also died six months later. I was left all alone in the world, since I was their only child".
Prakash then decided to make money by cheating ashrams and godmen. He started searching for them on internet and then sent them mails, offering to donate vehicles for their service projects. He would ask them to deposit money in a bank account towards payment of road tax, insurance and conveyance. Some of the ashrams responded and Prakash collected money from them.
However, when the police cross-checked his expenses, they came to know that he had hardly used any money he got from ashrams for himself. He had been distributing this money for medical expenses and school fees for the poor. Interestingly, Prakash had returned the money to some Ashrams, when he found that they were funding money for social causes.
In one case, he returned the money to one NGO which took care of the blind children.
A modern Robin Hood, who defrauded religious institutions to the tune of several lakhs of rupees and spent the money to help the poor was arrested here.
R Prakash, a mechanical engineer, hailing from Madurai, in south Tamil Nadu, had cheated a few ashrams and spent the money to help the underprivileged to get education, medical treatment and donated money to NGOs to carry out social work, the police said.
The cyber crime cell of Chennai police arrested him following a complaint by a Chennai-based ashram. The mechanical engineer was brought to the city from Elur, a village in Andhra Pradesh, where he was living with a widow. The 39-year-old graduate, who met the widow with two children had sympathised with her for her pathetic condition and had married her.
According to the police, Prakash decided to take the route to crime after his father was cheated by a self-styled godman in his native town of Madurai. His father Rajagopal lost more than Rs two lakh to the godman who offered to help the family tide over their problems.
The arrested engineer said, "my father who received about Rs 3.5 lakh when he retired from his company as retirement benefits, spent most of it on the godman, hoping that his problems would be solved. But nothing was solved. My father fell and died within six months. My mother also died six months later. I was left all alone in the world, since I was their only child".
Prakash then decided to make money by cheating ashrams and godmen. He started searching for them on internet and then sent them mails, offering to donate vehicles for their service projects. He would ask them to deposit money in a bank account towards payment of road tax, insurance and conveyance. Some of the ashrams responded and Prakash collected money from them.
However, when the police cross-checked his expenses, they came to know that he had hardly used any money he got from ashrams for himself. He had been distributing this money for medical expenses and school fees for the poor. Interestingly, Prakash had returned the money to some Ashrams, when he found that they were funding money for social causes.
In one case, he returned the money to one NGO which took care of the blind children.
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