Police bust fake passport racket in Chennai, 4 Lankans held

CHENNAI: The ‘Q’ branch police have busted an elaborate human trafficking racket with the arrest in the city of four Sri Lankan nationals who not only forged passports and visas but also made arrangements for Lankan Tamils to travel to France and Canada via Nepal.
Police on Wednesday said the arrested men, R Balachandran alias Bala, 48, a resident in Ram Nagar near Ambattur, P Lingaran alias Athiaman, 43, a resident of Bharathi Nagar in Maduravoyal, G Jayadasan, 43, a resident of Krishna Nagar Main Road in Maduravoyal, and G Dhanushan, 22, a resident of Ambattur, all Sri Lankan Tamils, were originally from Jaffna in Sri Lanka.
They made fake Indian passports in Chennai that they used to dispatch Sri Lankan Tamils to France and Canada over the past year.
Investigators believe several other individuals were involved in the racket.
Acting on a tip, a police team on Tuesday raided a house on Krishna Nagar Main Road in Maduravoyal, from where they apprehended the suspects. A court has remanded them in judicial custody.
Investigations revealed that the gang sent at least 50 Sri Lankan Tamils to France and Canada with fake travel documents.

“They charged each individual between Rs 3 lakh and Rs 5 lakh for the entire package — the fake passports plus visas to France or Canada made using bogus local addresses in Nepal,” an investigating officer said.
Police said the traffickers targeted Sri Lankan Tamils staying outside refugee camps in the city and in other parts of the state. The racketeers used Nepal as a stopover for the Lankan Tamils en route to France and Canada because they had been unable to secure visas for them when they applied from India or Sri Lanka.
Immediately after the arrest of the four suspects, a team of ‘Q’ branch sleuths raided their houses in Ambattur and Maduravoyal. During searches, police recovered bundles of empty passport books, a laptop and a few pen drives, equipment to make fake passports and an embossing machine.
“The traffickers had come to India by illegal ferry in 2012 and had been staying in Maduravoyal and Ambattur since then,” the investigating officer said.
Police have gathered some information about the Lankan nationals who they sent to France and Canada. Investigators suspect that unscrupulous officials may have helped the suspects make the fake passports.
“We will seek their custody for questioning. There are unsolved elements in the case,” the officer said.