KOCHI: The Palarivattom Police on Sunday arrested one more person in the navy job recruitment fraud, wherein 20 persons were duped in the promise of being given jobs in the Navy. Reji Kumar, 43, a native of Kunammavu, Varapuzha is the arrested. The police had already detained Jobin Manuel, a Kottayam native, who ran Gazza International, a fake agency in Palarivattom.
According to the police, more than `50 lakh has been swindled from the victims. “The fraud was operated at the agency named Gazza International in Palarivattom. The accused were offering jobs to officer posts and as junior clerks in the Kochi Naval Base and Visakhapatnam Naval Base,” said an officer. More complaints are pouring in and the police are tracing the possibility of involvement by any retired Navy personnel in the cheating case.
The police say Reji’s father, who passed away two years ago, was an employee of Naval Armament Depot (NAD). However, Reji never informed the Navy of his father’s demise and continued to receive benefits without handing over the identity card. “Jobin told job aspirants that the NAD branch was opening in Kerala. In the guise of identifying land for this project, he constituted a co-operative society in Angamaly. Reji Kumar was appointed as its president and fraud was committed in the name of the society too,” said an officer.
The duo had visited highly sensitive areas of Kochi Naval Base and NAD several times, the officer said. Jobin Manuel was arrested on May 16 by Palarivattom police for impersonating a naval officer who promised the jobs. He allegedly used fake identification documents and uniform to dupe job aspirants.