Two Indian conmen from India’s Uttar Pradesh state were arrested this week for allegedly conning a local physician into paying them a whopping $335,000 for a magical lamp capable of granting him any wish.

Dr Laeek Khan, a physician from the Khairnagar area, in Meerut city, first met the conmen in 2018, when visiting a patient’s home to dress her wounds following a surgery.

One day, while at Sameena’s home, the doctor met a self-described ‘tantrik’ who boasted about his magical powers, and later promised to make Khan a billionaire. The tantrik, named Islamuddin, soon introduced the doctor to his partner, Anees, and the two offered to sell him a real-life wish-granting Aladdin Ka Chirag (Aladdin’s Lamp) for only 2.5 crore ($335,000). The London-trained doctor agreed…

Getting tricked into buying Aladdin’s lamp for a small fortune might sound dumb, but Dr Laeek Khan claims that the two tantriks were very convincing, often using a fragrant perfume to fool him into thinking that the jinn (genie) was coming out of the lamp. He would later realize that the magical genie was actually Islamuddin, but by then he had already paid the conmen almost the entire sum they had agreed upon, in installments.

After making multiple payments, the doctor asked to take Aladdin’s lamp home with him, but the two men kept telling him that it was a bad idea, and that simply touching it would cause bad things to happen to him. After being rejected several times, Laeek Khan finally realized he was being conned and approached the Meerut Superintendent of Police to have the two conmen arrested.

Islamuddin and his friend Anees were both apprehended by police, and the “magical” lamp retrieved. Sadly, police couldn’t convince the jinn to come out… They are now searching for Sameena, who, it turns out, was Islamuddin’s wife.