Two police constables, two postmen and three passport office staff were arrested late on Wednesday night in the illegal immigration rackets.
MUMBAI: Two police constables, two postmen and three passport office staff were arrested late on Wednesday night in the illegal immigration rackets being investigated by the Mumbai crime branch. With this, the total number of people arrested in three separate cases goes up to 21.
The two constables, Nitin More, 35, Mahadev Londe, 35, from Byculla police station and the two Mazgaon postmen, Maruti Shinde, 47, and Mohan Vichare, 44, were picked up in connection with a racket to send people illegally to the UK.
According to the police, the two constables charged Aslam Panchal (arrested earlier) Rs5,000 per passport for verification. Panchal reportedly made 35 bogus passports, 11 of which were for himself.
Postman Maruti Shinde delivered 14 bogus passports to Panchal, while Vichare delivered five in spite of the fake addresses. They charged Rs2000 per address, said joint commissioner of police (crime), Rakesh Maria.
Two passport office employees Ashok Chandiramani, 57, and Pradeep Shelar, 53, now working in Surat were arrested for their alleged involvement in an immigration racket with the US as the destination. They used to work at the Mumbai passport office.
“During the US illegal immigration racket investigation, we learnt that the passports were issued to Yousuf Baig and Asif Kadawala (arrested earlier) with the assistance of Chandiramani and Shelar,” said Maria.
Police said Baig and Kadawala had taken two women and two children to the US and another woman to the UK in 2006, passing them off as wives and children.
Police added that Shelar and Chandiramani were earlier arrested in 2006 in a similar case in Mumbai following which they were suspended and subsequently reinstated and later transferred to Surat.
The third official Nareshkumar Dayabhai, 42, is linked to a passport agent, Siraj Kothadia, who is in police custody in the US illegal immigration racket.
“Tajuddin Khan alias Sipran D’Souza, 34, a real estate agent whose visa application was rejected by the US consulate in November 2006, was trying his luck to go to the UK this time. Kothadia asked him to take a new passport under a fictitious name and address and suggested the name of Dayabhai posted at Surat,” said Maria.
Dayabhai allegedly made the passport in the name of Sipran D’Souza for Khan and also arranged for other documents which said that D’Souza was a resident of the Valsad district.
He got a passport having fake details in June 2007 and later applied for a visa to the UK consulate. Dayabhai was posted at Surat following his arrest in a similar offence in Mumbai in 2001, Maria said.
While, Dayabhai was remanded to police custody till December 27, the others were remanded till December 24, said the police.
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