BENGALURU: Private detective agencies are now hiring college students, armed with networking skills and tech knowledge, to help them crack cases. There are over 300 licensed private investigation agencies in the city, and most of them employ students on a freelance basis.
“Students come in very handy,” Naman Jain, managing director of Sleuths India Detective, which has been in the market for over 20 years, said. “Sometimes our regular employees find it difficult to access information. But students have good networking skills and access to many places. Also, they are tech-savvy,” he added.
Private detective agencies are the go-to option for people who want guarded background checks on prospective brides and grooms, and employees. They also help parents keep tabs on children, while companies need to check duplication, and spouses want details about suspected infidelity. Students work as detectives in all these cases.
“While we hire most of them on a freelance basis, some are so good at extracting information that we hire them,” Kishan Rao of Eagle Eye Detective Services said. A B.Com student from a private college told CE on condition of anonymity, “I enjoy being a detective. It’s in my genes. My grandfather was in the police and I always wanted to be a cop, but I am not so good at studies.
But I can do the same kind of job that he did,” Shashank (name changed) quipped, adding that he was introduced to an agency located on MG Road through a friend. “I was assigned a case where I had to get evidence related to a pre-matrimonial case. I was shocked to find out that the boy had put up a ‘person-next-door’ image on his social media profiles but was a flirt in real life,” he revealed.
Shashank said he followed the man, took pictures, gathered information about him and handed it over to the agency. Though he was curious to know if the marriage was cancelled, the agency didn’t divulge that information. He has worked in several other cases, including tracing a missing teenager, finding out cases of drug addiction, and cheating spouses.
One needs patience, presence of mind and ability to maintain secrecy to do the job, said Jain. “We conduct an elaborate interview after going through the candidate’s resume. A general aptitude test is done. The job aspirants are given situations and asked how they would handle it or solve a case,” he added.
Though educational background is not much of a criteria, certain qualifications are more preferred. Students of criminology, forensic science and mass communication show more interest. However, even engineering and commerce students apply for the ‘job’ and internships.
Both boys and girls, aged between 18 and 25 years, are hired since that is when they are mature enough to understand the case and can enter pubs. Many engineering students help in cracking cybercrime-related cases. Cameras, recorders, microphones are given to them and they are taught how to handle these equipments.
They are sent on the field only after training and briefing. “We tell them to reveal their identities when caught but never give out the client’s details. We ask them to call us when things go wrong,” Divyansh Narona, a private detective, said. “But that happens rarely. Boys and girls are very smart.”
Job Details