MADURAI:A 41-year-old Sri Lankan national was arrested on Friday when he tried to travel using a fake Indian passport from here. He was booked under the Foreigners Act of 1946.
According to police, Raja Mahendran, son of Rajendran, is originally from Sri Lanka, who landed in Tiruchy three years ago.
In order to avoid paying the penalty for staying beyond the stipulated time period, he procured a fake Indian passport using his Tiruchy address.
But, on Friday, when he attempted to leave for Colombo from here, he got exposed as his answers to the queries of the immigration officials proved to be contradictory, police added.
On further interrogation, it was revealed that Raja Mahendran has been repeatedly committing the offence of obtaining fake passports. He had first landed in India in 1984 along with his family as Sri Lankan nationals. In order to avoid getting deported, his family illegally secured Indian ration cards. Even though his family has been staying here ever since, Raja Mahendran had obtained a fake passport, for the first time in 1995.
In 2006, he managed to secure a Lankan passport using which he travelled to Qatar. Then, in 2012, Raja Mahendran reached India on a tourist visa. And having exceeded his period of stay, he applied for another Indian passport using fake documents, added the police.
When it was pointed out by the authority that he had already been issued a passport in 1995, he told them that he had lost it.
He was issued a second passport only after making sure that the formalities for cancelling the old one was completed.