KATHMANDU: Police on Sunday arrested a man for his alleged involvement in cheating a woman in the pretext of exchanging US dollars.

The suspect is Narayan Bahadur Bhandari aka Laksha (33) from Karthali-6 of Sindhupalchok district.

Bhandari along with Saroj Bhandari (23) from the same place defrauded 28-year-old Minmaya Tamang in the pretext of exchanging the latter's Nepali notes with the US currency, police said.

The Bhandari duo repeatedly called Tamang to convince that they had USD 19,000 and they were ready to exchange it for Rs 1 million, according to police.

Accordingly, they had a meeting in Gwarko of Lalitpur on January 1, when the duo handed her a bundle of 288 one-dollar banknotes hidden under three 50-dollar ones and claimed the pack had USD 19,000.

The gullible Tamang then handed them Rs 1 million, which they divided equally.

While Saroj fled the scene with his sum of Rs 500,000, Narayan was caught in possession of Rs 500,000, police said.

The law enforcers also seized USD 438 that the woman was receiving.

Police said the arrestee was dragged in a similar case around one and half years ago.

The suspect has been sent to the Department of Revenue Investigation for further investigation and action in accordance with the Foreign Exchange Act, 1962.