20 agents arrested in four days for immigration fraud

Parveen Arora

Tribune News Service

Karnal, June 24

The office of SIT head and IG Karnal Range, Bharti Arora, is flooded with fresh complaints by youths who had been duped by immigration agents on the pretext of sending them abroad.

This SIT was constituted by the state government to inquire into the cases after the US government had deported over 140 youths of the state. 

In the fresh complaints received by the SIT head, the police have registered 33 FIRs related to cheating by the agents. So far, the SIT has arrested 34 agents and seized Rs 40 lakh from them. Of the total 71 accused, 38 have been booked in multiple cases.

“We have arrested 20 accused in the past four days and registered 33 FIRs on the fresh complaints from those who had been duped by agents,” Bharti Arora told The Tribune.

The investigation conducted by the SIT revealed that semi-literate youths having rural background are soft targets of such agents and they lure them on the pretext of showing dreams of better lifestyle and easy money.

“The arrested persons admitted that they used to lure youths of rural areas, who had very less qualification and not much land, on the pretext of sending them abroad. Most of the victims either had sold their land or borrowed money from others,” she added.

The SIT has also added Sections of human trafficking in most of the cases and is now going to add Sections of extortion.

“The cases of deported youths are clear-cut cases of human trafficking and we have added Section 370 of the IPC. In some cases, we found that the agents had confiscated the passports of the victims and demanded more money from their family members. So, we will add Sections of extortion in those cases,” the IG added.