Kovai woman cheats 6 men with marriage bait, held

In the guise of marriage, the woman had cheated six men across the state to the tune of several crore of rupees. Acting on a complaint from a Salem man, the woman and her family were arrested by the cyber crime branch police.

Though Sruthi alias Mythili Venkatesh’s list of victims, who were floored by her stylish looks, is a long one, the latest on the list was Balamurugan (29) an engineer from Edappadi in Salem district. He had lost Rs 41 lakh to the woman.

According to police, Balamurugan was working in Germany and had registered in a matrimonial site, through which he got introduced to Sruthi from Coimbatore. She gradually developed a relationship with Balamurugan through frequent phone talk and social media chat.

“After winning his confidence, the woman took Rs 5 lakh stating that she needed the amount for treatment of her mother, who was diagnosed with brain tumour. Citing various reasons, she has been taking money from him frequently,” he said.

A friend of Balamurugan, who came to know of his affair, alerted him of Sruthi’s dubious character. When Balamurugan pulled her up, Sruthi severed her relationship with him.

Acting on a complaint lodged by him, the cyber crime personnel conducted inquiries and found out that Sruthi had duped several men following the same modus operandi.

She had conned Santhosh Kumar from Namakkal of Rs 43 lakh, Sasi Kumar from Namakkal of Rs 22 lakh, Sundar from Nagapattinam of Rs 15 lakh, Rajkamal from Dindugul of Rs 21 lakh and 20 sovereigns of jewels from Arulkumaragururaja from Chidambaram.

A case of matrimonial fraud has already been registered against her by the CCB in 2016. She had been evading arrest since then by changing her residence. Cases are also pending against her in Chennai and other districts in the state.

Sruthi’s mother Chitra, 48, who was running an online matrimonial site, is said to have lured several wealthy youngsters by sending attractive photos of her daughter. Police arrested Sruthi, her mother, step father Prasanna Venkatesh (38), brother Subash (18) and her friend Sabarinath (23), son of a commercial tax official from Anna Nagar in Chennai from their residence in Coimbatore on Thursday.