Mr.Natwarlal-The Great ConMan of India

Most of us have watched the movie Mr.Natwarlal starring Amitabh Bachchan which was released in the year 1979 and the movie was inspired named after The Real Natwarlal of India..Any Guesses about whom I am talking here…

Let me introduce him–

Name-Mithilesh Kumar Srivastava
Born-1912
Death-1996/2009
Birthplace- Bangra Village,Siwan,Bihar
Profession-Lawyer/Conman

Mithilesh Kumar Srivastava aka Natwarlal

He was a master of disguises,used more than 50 aliases and used novel ideas to cheat and was master in forging signatures of famous personalities.His cheated list include Birlas and Dhirubhai Ambani and he cheated them by posing as Social Worker,He even cheated many shop-owners lakhs of rupees,paying them by cheque or demand drafts which were usually forged.

But the most notable events in his conman career was selling repeatedly the Taj Mahal thrice, the Red Fort twice, and the Rashtrapati Bhavan and also the Parliament House of India along with its 545 sitting members once respectively.Can you guys believe that,Someone selling these monuments in Real Life–He was a Living Legend and I will not be wrong to call him a Legend after his death.

He was arrested several times and each time he just con the Police and The Police were left with no idea where he vanish.According to reports he was last seen on 24th June 1996 while he was being transported from prison to hospital for treatment.He vanished from custody that day at the New Delhi Railway station when he was being taken on a wheelchair from Kanpur to AIIMS for treatment. He was 84 of age at that time.

He was so pro in his act that his exploits were often compared with Frank Abagnaleand Victor Lustig.Victor Lustig is better known as “The Man who sold Eiffel Tower Twice” and
Frank Abagnale became notorious for impersonating a pilot, a doctor, and a laywer while in his early 20s.Abagnale’s life story provided the inspiration for the feature film “Catch Me If You Can”

Back to Natwarlal–He also has a mysterious death,while his lawyer says that he died on 25th July 2009 at the age of 97,however, Natwarlal’s brother, Ganga Prasad Srivastava, subsequently claimed to have cremated him in 1996.He was in the wanted list with over a 100 cases in 8 States. He had been sentenced to a massive 113 years in jail by various courts and had made eight daring escapes,each time from a different jail.

But the people of his native village take a pride that he belonged to their village and have decided to put up a statue of him as his monument,at the place,where his house once stood.And if the words of the people of his village are to be believed he was no less than RobinHood,who loot the rich and helped the poor….. 🙂

Whatever he was,the fact is that he was very talented and that’s what I feel and I guess he is no more a big culprit in today’s world,because he has been overtaken our politicians who loot the nation with both hands open and never leave any chance to make some bucks out of country’s resources….

Reference–wikipedia.com,google.com