The Odisha police on Monday arrested a man having as many as 14 wives for allegedly duping them of lakhs of rupees by posing as a doctor.

All his victims were highly educated, the police said, adding one of them is a professor, a doctor and an officer in the Armed Police Forces.

The accused, Ramesh Chandra Swain, 65, a father of five children, had married his first wife in 1982 and second wife in 2002. Between 2002 and 2020, he befriended 12 other women through matrimonial websites and married them posing as a doctor.

He has three children from his first wife and two from his second wife.

While the first wife is settled in his village in Kendrapara district, the second wife, a doctor, is living in Allahabad in Uttar Pradesh.

“Swain married the second wife in a court. The second wife has not lodged any complaint and doesn't want to be disturbed,” a police officer said.

The deputy commissioner of police (DCP) Umashankar Dash told reporters that Swain was arrested on the basis of a complaint filed by a teacher whom he had married at Arya Samaj, in Janakpuri, New Delhi, in 2019.”

The matter came to light after Swain brought the teacher to Bhubaneswar from Delhi and stayed in a flat as husband and wife. “However, she became suspicious about Swain’s activities and realised that she had been cheated. Later, she approached the police and the cheating spree of Swain came to light. A case was lodged against him in July 2021,” the police said.

On being asked why police took such a long time to arrest him, inspector in charge of Mahila police station, Santosini Behera told The Telegraph, “The accused is extremely clever and spent a lot of time outside the state. However, we finally managed to nab him from a house in the Khandagiri area. Swain claimed that the house belongs to him but we are verifying the records”

Behera said: “We have seized a number of documents relating to his educational qualification. Now we are verifying all these documents. He has done his graduation in science.”

“Swain used to target middle-aged women who sought companionship. He introduced himself as a doctor, won their trust and later left them after taking away their money,” the police said.

He had also married a woman working with the Indo Tibetan Police Force (ITBP) in 2018 and duped her of around Rs 10 lakh.

“We have already established contact with nine of the victims and we are conducting an investigation about his mode of operation and financial transactions,” the police added.

The police have seized 11 ATM cards, four Aadhaar cards and other incriminating documents from Swain. A case has been registered against him at the Mahila police station under various sections of IPC on charges of harassment, cheating, forgery, and trying to marry again during the lifetime of a wife.

Police sources said earlier he had been arrested in Ernakulam in Kerala in 2006 and in Hyderabad in 2011 on the charges of duping unemployed youths on the pretext of providing them jobs and getting them admission in the MBBS courses.