French Embassy visa fraud: CBI searches premises of Ludhiana agent, recovers Rs 70 lakh from bank locker
It is alleged that the agent collected cash ranging from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 45 lakh from each applicant for obtaining Schengen visa from the French Embassy in Delhi.
The CBI had earlier registered a case against six private persons, including two ex-employees of the French Embassy in Delhi. (File) The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday conducted searches at the premises of a private agent in Ludhiana district in the ongoing investigation of a case related to visa fraud in the French Embassy.
Incriminating materials were recovered during the searches, a CBI spokesperson said. The agency also recovered Rs 70.10 lakh (in denominations of Rs 2000) from a bank locker in Ludhiana.
The probe agency, in a press statement, said that during its investigation it came to light the involvement of a private agent based at Machhiwara of Ludhiana in facilitating issuance of Schengen visas to the applicants. It is alleged that he collected cash ranging from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 45 lakh from each applicant for obtaining Schengen visa from the French Embassy in Delhi.
The CBI had earlier registered a case against six private persons, including two ex-employees of the French Embassy in Delhi. It was alleged that the ex-employees of the Embassy conspired with other accused and perpetrated a visa fraud during the period from January to May last year.
It was further alleged that in pursuance to the said conspiracy, applicants from Punjab and Jammu submitted fake and forged letters purportedly written by a private company based at Bengaluru to the Consulate General of France, Bengaluru for issuing entry visas, for their joining in private companies in Port-Le-Havre, France. On being approached by the applicants, the said two officials in the visa department of the Embassy allegedly issued Entry Visas in favour of three other accused after taking illegal gratification of Rs 50,000 per visa without the knowledge and approval of the head of the visa department of the Embassy. It was also alleged that after the issuance of Entry Visa, the said two officials displaced/destroyed the documents/files from the department.
It was also alleged that several files were allegedly handled by these accused, which mostly pertained to individuals i.e. young farmers or unemployed people from Punjab who had not travelled earlier and that the accused had perpetrated fraud of huge amounts in the visa department of the Embassy.
Searches were earlier conducted in December last year at six locations including at Delhi, Patiala, Gurdaspur and Jammu, at the premises of the accused. Incriminating documents/articles including laptop, mobile phones, suspicious passports etc were recovered.
Share
