Tamluk, Nov. 20: What was supposed to be their Gift of the Magi moment ended in heartbreak.

A young woman who rode a scooter gifted by her boyfriend on her birthday to give him a surprise on a date realised to her dismay that he had stolen the two-wheeler a few days ago from the same area.

When the woman, a resident of West Midnapore, reached the banks of the Rupnarayan in East Midnapore yesterday to meet her boyfriend, villagers recognised the scooter by its grey and blue colour and accosted the couple.

Police, who had informed the villagers about the colour, model and registration number of the scooter, were called and the man - 36-year-old air-conditioner and electronic goods mechanic Sheikh Anwar - was arrested. The 30-year-old woman, a vegetable vendor, said she was shattered and did not want to keep any relation with her boyfriend.

At Kolaghat police station, Anwar, who has been remanded in five days' police custody, said he wanted to gift his girlfriend "something special" on her birthday on November 16.

"She had told me that she loved to ride scooters. So I decided to gift her one on her birthday. I enquired and found out that a scooter cost around Rs 43,000, which I could not afford. Then I remembered that when I had gone to the Kolaghat power plant township (near Faridbahala village, where he lives), I had seen a TVS Scooty Pep Plus on the veranda of a ground-floor flat. I decided to steal it," Anwar said.

Anwar said he had thought that if he could take the two-wheeler to West Midnapore, he would not get caught.

"I had planned to tell my girlfriend a few days later to get the Scooty painted in a different colour. I was also planning to fit it with a false number plate. I had not expected her to come riding on it to meet me," he said.

A police officer said Anwar stole the Scooty in the early hours of November 14 and got a duplicate key done.

As the scooter is three years old, Anwar had told his girlfriend that he had bought it from a friend at a low price so that she did not get suspicious.

The police said the scooter belonged to the wife of Biswanath Das, an employee of the Kolaghat power plant.

Anwar and his girlfriend are both separated and met for the first time a year ago.