KOCHI: Five Tiruchirappalli natives were intercepted at the Kochi airport while trying to board a flight to Kuala Lumpur with fake documents. Balamurugan Raman, 43, Vinoth Amalraj, 32, Vignesh Shanmughan, 25, Selvam Kuzhhaiyan, 30, and Venkatesh Ramalingam, 20, were intercepted by the officials of the Bureau of Immigration during clearance process around 8pm on Saturday.
“They were found possessing a fake NOC issued by a company named Sea Marine Engineers at Kadavanthra. The employee identity cards they possessed were also fake. They were on the way to Hong Kong via Kuala Lumpur seeking jobs. They were to board an Air Asia flight that was to leave from Kochi airport in the wee hours of Sunday,” an official said.
Later, the Nedumbassery police were intimated, and they were shifted to the police station. The police after interrogating them registered a case under IPC section 465 for forgery and section 471 for using fake documents as genuine. The decision on recording the arrest would be taken after a thorough interrogation.
In the recent months, several persons from Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu were intercepted for attempting to go abroad using fake documents.
“In most cases, people are cheated by agents who arrange fake documents. These agents charge hefty sums from people promising highly-paid jobs abroad. Recently, we arrested two Andhra-based agents who were into arranging fake documents for immigration purposes,” a police officer said.