Anil’s pucca house in Alipurduar on Sunday. Picture by Anirban Choudhury

Alipurduar, June 15: A teacher of a primary school here has been cheated of nearly Rs 2.6 lakh by a con man who promised to ward off the “evil eye”.

Dibyendu Prasad Roy, the teacher in the primary section of Alipurduar McWilliam High School, has lodged an FIR against Anil Ghosh (60), who is also a rickshaw-puller.

In his first meeting, Anil had taken Rs 1,000 from Dibyendu and promised to cure his ailing mother. Two years later, the rickshaw-van puller told the teacher that if he would dole out Rs 55,000, his brother would escape an imminent accident.

Anil’s first visit to Dibyendu’s house in Ward VIII was three years ago when he went there to ask for books for his children. The 26-year-old teacher had obliged him.

In the days that followed, Dibyendu claimed, the rickshaw-puller “blackmailed him emotionally” a number of times. Dibyendu ended up by paying him about Rs 2.60 lakh. He borrowed money from his colleagues to pay him.

Yesterday, when Dibyendu again asked for Rs 60,000 from one of his colleagues, the teachers suspected foul play. They reported his frequent borrowings to his maternal uncle who stays nearby.

Dibyendu, who had so far kept all his dealings with Anil secret, broke down under pressure from colleagues and relatives.

“I do not know why I have given Anil the money. I suspect he also laced the tea and food with drugs that he offered me when I visited his house twice. After taking them, I often lost track of what was happening around me. And after that, when he asked for the money, I paid it to him unhesitatingly. The currency looked like ordinary paper. I had also behaved unnaturally with my relatives and friends for the past one year,” Dibyendu said.

After the teacher lodged the police complaint, residents of the area rushed to Anil’s pucca house only to find him missing. “I do not like my husband duping others and knew that he would fall in trouble one day. He is dead for me from today,” Anil’s wife Usha said.

Later in the afternoon, the residents saw Anil’s house locked.

Nikhil Dey, a businessman, said Anil had also taken Rs 25,000 from him, promising to cure his grandson Akash who has been suffering from a blood disease.

“We had been to Vellore where the doctors said the disease is incurable. One day Anil came to me and told me that if I paid him the money, he would cure Akash. Today Anil was supposed to deliver us the medicine. I am sure that he has cheated me too,” said Dey who has also lodged an FIR against the rickshawpuller.

S.R. Misra, the additional superintendent of police in Alipurduar, said: “We raided Anil’s house last night but found him missing. We will definitely arrest him.”