Railway job scam: 25 people duped, cops suspect big racket at play

A Railway job scam has come to the fore after the Goregaon Police, on Sunday, registered a case of cheating against a few people, who have been accused of duping over 25 candidates by giving them hoax assurances of a ticket collector's job in the Indian Railways. A Crime Branch unit of 11 officers informed the Goregaon Police after the team was approached by the 37-year-old complainant. The accused, allegedly, accepted Rs 7 lakh from each and every candidate they fooled. The police suspect a bigger scam at play given the amount of money misappropriated and the number of people cheated.

As per the police, the complainant — an Airoli resident — has been unemployed for a while. He had gotten in touch with one of the accused, who promised him a ticket collector's job in the Indian Railways. The complainant was also assured of a handsome salary and other government allowances and benefits, the police said. The victim also told the police that people from Goregaon, Navi Mumbai, Varanasi, and West Bengal fell for this trap. The accused had even called candidates for an entrance examination and hence, nobody could suspect foul play.

"A total of 25 people, mostly youth looking for employment opportunities, were asked to pay a sum of Rs 7 lakh in cash or via Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) payment option after they had cleared the entrance examination. We were asked to go to West Bengal for six months of training in May 2016. After three months, we were given our appointment letters, payment slips, and identity cards even before we joined duty. Our names were also shown on an Indian Railways website. We all thought we have been appointed and were ready to join," The complainant said on the condition of anonymity.

According to the police, the candidates later discovered that papers given to them were fake and there was no vacancy against their names at the respective Railway designations. "Preliminary investigation revealed that the accused had opened a fake Railways website to escape suspicion. Rajesh Kumar, Manish Singh, Sanjeev Rai, and Seema Pawar have so far been identified. The others are yet to be identified," a senior police officer said.

A case has been registered under sections 120-B, 406, 419, 420, 465, 467, 468, 471, 472, 473, and 475 of the Indian Penal Code and section 66(c) and 66(d) of the Information Technology Act.

Similar fraud incident:

In April, 26-year-old civil engineer Santosh Ade had registered a complaint with the Agripada Police after he was duped by three people who assured him a job in Group-C of the Indian Railways. Ade alleged that the accused demanded a total of Rs 25 lakh from him, out of which he paid Rs 9.1 lakh.