The police are investigating and searching for the suspects, who may be in Maharashtra or Rajasthan. (Source: File)
A woman in Ahmedabad who lost both her son and husband to untimely deaths, was cheated of over Rs 14 lakh by a man and woman claiming to be aghoris– practitioners of black magic- who claimed they could contact her deceased family members and help remove the evil eye from her household.
In the FIR filed at Vejalpur police station in Ahmedabad on Sunday (October 5), the complainant 41-year-old Shabnam Mohammad Hussain, said she found channels of “Tantrik Baba” and “Specialist Black Magic Karibaba Molanaji” on YouTube in February, from where she got phone numbers and contacted them asking about the untimely deaths of her family members.
The accused person told her that her household had been “cursed by black magic” and that she would need to perform aghori rituals in order to lift the curse. Stringing her along with one problem after another, the accused persons kept asking for more and more money from the widow under some pretext or another.
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As per her complaint, she had contacted the accused only over phone.
At one point, the FIR states that the accused told her that a major aghori ritual would have to be carried out where she would have to offer up a human sacrifice. The FIR states that when the complainant said she had no human sacrifice to offer, the accused came up with another scheme that said human sacrifice could be bypassed if four tantriks performed the ritual together, but that it would cost her Rs2.3 lakh per performer, which came up to Rs9.2 lakh, which she paid on April 22.
Not content with this, the accused came up with another ritual saying that the woman accused would “consult with Hussain’s deceased husband and son in the cemetery” where they would use a “black snake trapped in a pot” and that she would have to pay Rs 3.15 lakh more for this ritual or she would die. The FIR states that Hussain took several loans in order to pay the accused persons, ultimately having paid them Rs14.18 lakh.
She finally filed a complaint at Vejalpur police station. In the FIR, Ram Pratap Dhanraj Bhargav and Gurumata alias Vijendradevi were booked under BNS sections 308(5) (extortion by fear of hurt or death), 318(2) (cheating) and 54 (abettor present).
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PI RM Chauhan of Vejalpur police station told the Indian Express, “Since the complainant has only spoken to the accused persons over the phone, we are still investigating the matter. We believe they may be in Maharashtra or Rajasthan. We have dispatched teams to look for and apprehend both of them.”
