There’s an imposter among us. Whether it’s, 'The Tinder Swindler' or 'Inventing Anna', there’s something irresistibly human about deception. It taps into our innate desire for answers, for closure in a world often defined by its uncertainties. But some mysteries are more than just puzzles waiting to be solved. This one is a reminder that sometimes, the search for answers leads us to even more unsettling truths. And that’s why we should care — because in every mystery, there’s a piece of ourselves searching for resolution.
In the quiet, sun-dappled village of Murgawan, Bihar, where ancient banyan trees cast long shadows over crumbling brick walls, a story of a missing boy morphed into a decades-long saga of impersonation, fraud, and bitter family feuds. The protagonist — or should we say the antagonist — of this twisted tale is a man who, for over 40 years, lived a life that wasn’t his, convincing nearly everyone, including himself, that he was the rightful heir to a US$26 million estate. It’s a Bollywood potboiler come to life, minus the dance numbers.
The story begins in 1977. Sixteen-year-old Kanhaiya Singh, the only son of Kameshwar Singh, an affluent zamindar, left his home to take an exam in a neighboring town. He never returned. Panic spread like wildfire through the Singh household, and his father, Kameshwar, was heartbroken. He was a man who had everything — land, power, and status — but without an heir, his legacy seemed doomed. Days turned into months, and months into years, with no sign of the missing boy. The village whispered, speculated, and eventually moved on.
Then, in 1981, a miracle of sorts arrived, draped in saffron robes and chanting holy verses. Dressed as a sanyasi, he told the locals that he was the ‘son of a prominent person,’ claiming to be the long-lost Kanhaiya. Kameshwar, now partially blind and desperate for a miracle, welcomed him with open arms. After all, he had prayed, and here was his answer — his son, returned to him by the gods. The rest of the family, however, wasn’t as easily convinced. Ramsakhi Devi, Kanhaiya’s mother, was suspicious from the start. Her son, she knew, had a distinctive scar on his head — a scar this ‘Kanhaiya’ conveniently lacked.
Days after his arrival, Devi filed a case of impersonation and the man was arrested briefly and spent a month in jail before securing bail. But Kameshwar’s joy blinded him, literally and figuratively. What followed was a 40-year game of cat and mouse. The imposter, now ensconced in the Singh household, began living the life of a landlord’s son: attending college, getting married, raising a family, and slowly but surely selling off the family’s land. The daughters, six in total, were left in the shadows, fighting to protect their birthright in a world where daughters rarely inherited anything at all.
By 1990, Kameshwar had passed away, leaving behind a tangled web of legal battles and family strife. Ramsakhi followed him five years later, and it was then that Vidya Kumari, the only daughter who stayed in India, took up the fight against the imposter. Vidya’s suspicions weren’t just familial grievances — they were born of concrete evidence. A letter discovered by the police from 1988 pointed to the real identity of the man who had been living as her brother for nearly a decade. His name wasn’t Kanhaiya — it was Dayanand Gosai.
The case dragged on in court for years. It wasn’t until 2019 that the court demanded Gosai take a DNA test — a request he repeatedly refused. Yet, surprisingly, it wasn’t just the DNA test that brought him down. In a move straight out of a Bond film, Gosai produced a forged death certificate, claiming that the real Dayanand Gosai was dead. Despite this, the court wasn’t fooled, and in 2022, the hammer of justice finally fell. The court believed there was a wider conspiracy involving several people of Murgawan who had helped ‘plant’ Gosain into Singh’s family as his lost son.
Gosai, now 62, was sentenced to three years in jail for impersonation, three years for cheating, and six months for criminal conspiracy, all to be served concurrently — a slap on the wrist for someone who had lived a lie for four decades. The villagers of Murgawan, who had once whispered in awe of the boy who returned, now gossiped about the man who stole a life that wasn’t his. Vidya, though victorious in court, was left to pick up the pieces of a broken family legacy, haunted by the question that had started it all — where was her real brother?
The imposter, who claimed to be Kanhaiya, is now known only by his false name — Kanhaiya Ji, an honorific that drips with the irony of a life lived in deception. As for the real Kanhaiya Singh, his fate remains a mystery, swallowed by time and the secrets of a village that has seen too much.
In the end, this story isn’t just about a missing boy and an imposter; it’s about the fragility of identity in a world where appearances can be deceiving, and the truth is often buried beneath layers of lies. It’s a reminder that even in the quietest corners of rural India, fact can be stranger than fiction.
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