Alipurduar, Oct. 29: Keshab Das Sarkar, who had cheated at least 200 young men and women of lakhs of rupees, has been arrested.

Sarkar had duped the youths, all from Alipurduar block, by promising them jobs that never materialised.

The Alipurduar police caught Sarkar last night in Patkapara where he had gone to set up another fake placement school. His first venture, Sarkar Education Society, was located in Sonapur of Alipurduar I block.

“We were in search of Sarkar, who had cheated his way to more than Rs 50 lakh,” said Alipurduar additional superintendent of police K.B. Dorji. “We have arrested him and forwarded him to the court of the additional chief judicial magistrate. We have asked for five days in police remand for Sarkar because we believe we can extract a lot of valuable information from him.”

The Alipurduar police are also thinking of handing the case over to the enforcement branch or even the CBI.

From Sonapur, Sarkar had collected anything between Rs 5,000 and Rs 1 lakh per head from 200 youths, promising to give them jobs in schools, medical colleges, private companies, hospitals and other government offices as accountants, cashiers, receptionists and field officers. He made around Rs 50 lakh between October 2005 and May 2006, after which he disappeared. The fraud was brought to the notice of the administration when, on August 22, some of the victims lodged a complaint against Sarkar with the Jalpaiguri district magistrate.