New Delhi: A septuagenarian, absconding for nearly two decades after cheating people by posing as a senior Army officer, was arrested from an old-age home in Patiala, Punjab, on Sunday. According to the police, Sitaram Gupta (77) was declared a declared a proclaimed offender by the Karkardooma court on April 26 this year.
Gupta, a native of Mansa in Punjab, duped people by offering flats and shops under a fictitious Army Welfare Housing Organisation (AWHO) scheme, by posing as an Indian Army colonel.
“The accused is a postgraduate in Economics and History from the Panjab University and a former student of ex-Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He had been evading trial in a 2007 cheating case registered at Vivek Vihar police station in Delhi,” Apoorva Gupta, deputy commissioner of police (crime branch), Delhi Police, said.
He was arrested after taking Rs 56,000 from a complainant after offering him a flat and shop under the AWHO scheme and issuing forged receipts in 2007. He was subsequently granted bail and went underground, failing to appear before the court again. This led to the issuance of non-bailable warrants.
Gupta had apparently started his career as a contractor, supplying oil to Army cantonments across India, the police claimed. During this period, he gained insider knowledge of the Army’s functioning, which he later used to impersonate as a senior Army officer and lure unsuspecting people with promises of employment and housing benefits.
