HYDERABAD: The police on Thursday busted a fake international vaccination certificate racket with the arrest of a three-member gang as well as seizure of a large number of fake stamps, certificates and material required to prepare the forged documents.
The police action was based on a complaint lodged on July 22 by Ch Lavanya, Medical Officer of the Institute of Preventive Medicine (IPM). The accused, D Srinivas (35), worked as an outsourcing employee at the IPM. His work involved issuing certificates to people.
As time passed by, the con-artist gained proficiency in the job. Having understood how certificates are prepared, and the demand for them, he started forging certificates and sold it to people, police said.
The racket was noticed by her after she came across a fake certificate which was issued to one Katpalli Rajesh in October 2013 with her forged signature, fake stamps and fake document, police said.
She suspected the involvement of a former outsourcing employee in the act. Based on her complaint, a case was registered under Section 420, Section 468, Section 471 of the IPC and investigation was taken up.
A special team of the Narayanguda police station nabbed Srinivas, a businessman. During interrogation, he confessed to have committed the offence.
Accordingly, a raid was conducted on his residence,resulting in the recovery of huge material like forged stamps, printed yellow booklets, stamp pads and green ink pens, which were allegedly used to prepare fake international vaccination certificates, the release said.
Stamp makers S Prakash and P Anand, who allegedly forged stamps and printed yellow booklets illegally were apprehended. Investigations revealed that the accused Srinivas, who worked as a computer operator at the IPM for two years, observed lacuna in the system and decided to supply fake international vaccination certificates to students and people going abroad.
“He issued fake certificates to customers charging Rs 2,000 for each certificate. He confessed to have issued about 400 certificates and efforts are being made to identify those who have obtained the fake certificates. Action will be initiated against such people as per law,” the police said.