The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Job racketeers under scanner

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jun 02, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Job racketeers under scanner

Though the police alerts have been out on job racketeers, unemployed youth still succumb to the lucre of an overseas placement, says L. Srikrishna.

Despite sustained campaigns by the police and other government agencies cautioning the public against fake recruiters, many unemployed youth continue to be snared by false offers of a highly paying job abroad.

Gullible victims not only lose their money but also vital documents such as passport and degree certificates. But, given the substantial size of the job market, police interventions seem to have hardly made a dent on this nature of fraud.

During the last 500 days, the officers in the job racket wing attached to the Central Crime Branch (CCB) police in the Commissionerate received a little over 700 complaints against persons who had allegedly taken money on the pretext of providing overseas employment to aspirants.

Additional Commissioner of Police S. R. Jangid, who has been instrumental in streamlining the functioning of the job racket wing, said many petitioners hailed from Thanjavur, Tiruchi, Pudukottai, Sivaganga, Ramanathapuram and other districts. Since 2006, the total sum lost by the petitioners to the fake operators is Rs 8.75 crore and 143 persons figure as accused in the complaints.

`We have recovered Rs 2.52 crore and arrested 68 persons so far,' he added.

Police recently secured release of two persons from judicial custody as part of investigating a job racket complaint and recovered Rs 6.51 lakh in cash and 21 passports, based on confessions. Explaining the modus operandi, the ACP said the fake HR agents operated from posh offices using attractive letter pads and pamphlets claiming affiliation to international institutions or joint ventures. A couple of them even had websites to lure the educated unemployed into the trap.

The HR operators fabricated fake Income Tax (IT) returns to help candidates obtain visas. These operators allegedly forged the seals of Income Tax officers on the `Saral' forms. A special team recently seized fake appointment/offer letters in the name of some popular hotels abroad that were issued to some applicants. The police registered cases under the Passport Act 1967 and also under IPC Section 420 (cheating) following a complaint received from an embassy staff.

The police have disposed of 125 petitions out of 256 complaints received this year alone. Of 296 complaints registered last year, the police disposed of 32 petitions. Mr Jangid urged the unemployed youth not to fall for advertisements made by recruiting agents and suggested that aspirants double-check the background of the HR agents before formalising any agreement.

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