BHUVANESWAR: A 60-year-old man who allegedly married 14 women from seven states was arrested. The accused is a native of Kendrapara district in Odisha. He was arrested following a complaint lodged by his last wife.

The accused had married for the first time in 1982 and took a second wife in 2002. He has five children from these two marriages. In between 2002 and 2020, he married 12 other women via matrimonial websites. He mostly targeted middle-aged divorcee women. He had introduced himself as a doctor and deceived highly educated people including lawyers and doctors. A paramilitary force official is also among those deceived. The accused had been living in Odisha along with his last wife, a school teacher in Delhi. The wife who came to know about his multiple marriages, had lodged a complaint with the police.

The police have recovered 11 ATM cards, four Aadhaar cards and some documents from the accused. The police said that the man had been earlier arrested twice, for cheating unemployed youths and for a loan fraud in Hyderabad and Ernakulam.