Bangalore:
Powai resident Sangeetha Dungarwal, who was visiting her relatives in Bangalore last month, had stopped at Sri Krishna Jewellers on Commercial Street to check out a nose ring.
"I was wearing a ring having a diamond worth Rs 1.30 lakh when a salesman asked if he could take a look at the ring," said Dungarwal, a regular visitor to the store.
"He started showing me nose rings. I asked him for my diamond ring twice and he said other employees were looking at it," she said.
She added that the salesman engaged her in conversation for nearly 50 minutes and when she insisted he return the diamond ring, the salesman said they had sent it inside for polishing.
A livid Dungarwal then demanded the salesman hand over the ring at once.
"I had forgotten all about this until recently when a relative pointed out that the diamond had taken on a pale yellow hue.
I immediately took up the matter with the store," said Dungarwal, who is still in Bangalore.
"The diamond worth Rs 1.30 lakh was replaced with a fake," she alleged.
After initial denials, she said the shop owner agreed to return the diamond as Dungarwal was known to him.
"I later sent him a copy of the diamond's certificate. On seeing its cost, he backtracked and so I lodged a complaint at the local police station," she said.
"We have already begun investigating. We will decide what sections to apply to the case," an officer at Commercial Street police said.