If you had a genie in a bottle, what would your three wishes be? An Indian doctor recently faced this exact question, only he was rubbing a fake lamp.
Two men in India’s northern Uttar Pradesh state have been arrested after allegedly duping a doctor into purchasing an ‘Aladdin’s lamp’ said to bring wealth and good fortune to its owner. The doctor paid $93,000 (about R1 513 193) for the item, according to Al Jazeera.
Speaking to news outlet NDTV.com, Dr Laeek Khan explained that he met with the men while treating a woman he believed was their mother.
“Gradually they started telling me about a ‘baba’ (priest) whom they claimed also visited their home. They started brainwashing me and asked me to meet this baba,” Khan said.
He met with the priest, which is when he came across the lamp. During one of his visits, one of the men pretended to be an occultist and made a supernatural figure appear from the lamp. Khan later realised that the figure was just one of the men in disguise.
Dr Laeek Khan later approached the authorities after realising the lamp had no magical powers as promised. The men were arrested on Thursday, October 29 and were remanded in custody ahead of charges being filed. The wife of one of the men was also allegedly involved in the fraud.
“The cheats had struck a deal for much more but the doctor had paid about seven million rupees,’ Amit Rai, a senior officer said. “The men have also cheated other families using the same modus operandi. The total amount of money involved runs into several million rupees,” Rai said.
Picture: Uttar Pradesh Police