Police in India's Assam state have received a complaint from a prospective groom against his would-be in-laws for allegedly thrashing him for not disclosing that he wore a wig to conceal his baldness.
A chastened Prabir Das told police that no sooner had he stepped into his fiancee's home for dinner last week than she yanked off his wig. Thereafter, her parents and other relatives began beating and abusing him.
Mr Das said the family not only ripped his expensive wig apart but also relieved the 33-year-old hospital employee of his wallet, mobile phone, motorbike and driving licence as "penalty" for his deception.
Mr Das had advertised for a bride in the matrimonial columns of a local Bengali newspaper - a common phenomenon in India - and Dilip Roy, a retired state engineer seeking a match for his daughter Shreshta, responded.
A meeting between Mr Das and the prospective bride and their two families resulted in them becoming engaged.
The wedding was fixed for December 12th. And in keeping with Indian custom the bride's family began planning the traditional feasting and lavish present-giving to relatives and friends. At great expense they also began putting together Shreshta's trousseau and dowry.
But, sadly, no one in the bride's family knew the would-be groom's dark secret of what he had ingeniously concealed beneath a snugly fitting wig: his baldness.
To Mr Das's eventual humiliation, however, an acquaintance spilled the beans to the stunned Roys, who were expecting him for dinner the same evening.
A few hours later, as Mr Das stepped in his prospective in-laws' front door his would-be wife wrenched his wig off and almost simultaneously her mother slapped him hard.
Within seconds, the entire family had jumped on him and began beating him, abusing him for his duplicity.
A broken and hysterical Mr Das managed to escape, heading for the nearest police station determined on revenge.
"We have initiated an investigation on the basis of the complaint lodged by Das and detained Roy for interrogation," a police official, Rajen Singh, said last week.
Mr Roy has pleaded ignorance and told the police he was "shocked" to learn of his prospective son-in-law's baldness. The wedding, police said, appears to be off.