Sitting in his home in Palakkad district’s Kotai village, C V Rajan dials a Nigerian phone number every hour, hoping to hear a voice that for the past three months was constantly promising his son a fancy job in the UK. The promise never materialised and his 25-year-old son Praveen Kumar could not stand the shock—he committed suicide on November 18.The Nigerian fraud racket has left an indelible imprint in Palakkad district’s Kotai village, nestled in the northern tip of Kerala. Kumar, a hotel management graduate, was teaching at a private institute in Kozhikode earning Rs 7,500. Everything changed in August this year during a usual chat session on Yahoo messenger when one ‘Mark George’ contacted him. George identified himself as a consultant with a UK-based company Marathon Oil. As is the usual strategy, George asked Kumar to send him his CV. Within a day, Kumar got an e-mail offering him a job as assistant administrative officer with the company with a fat pay packet —£4600 per month — an offer Kumar found too lucrative to reject. “We did not want to reveal about the job offer to any one till something materialised for real,” said Kumar’s father C V Rajan, a senior tax assistant with the Customs and Central Excise department. This one decision probably turned fatal for the family. As next came a chain of demands for money for various certificates required to get to the UK. George introduced Kumar to a certain Lawrence Murray who posed as a risk manager with the UK Embassy in Delhi. Murray asked for money to arrange for visa. “Everyday there was a new demand and a new account number based in Delhi to which we had to deposit money,” added Rajan. Permanent Visa Certificate, Highly Skilled Migration certificate, Medical certificate and IELTS, Kumar paid for every thing at an exorbitant rate. The family had to pay Rs 54,000 for the medical certificate. Another Rs 1.8 lakh to get an IELTS certificate. The original examination fee for the exam is around Rs 7,000. All this money went to three different bank accounts registered in Delhi-an IDBI account in the name of Kamal Bashan, an Axis Bank account in the name of Ninghailiupamel and an ICICI Bank account in the name of Diana Dhemnethoi. In three months time, Kumar’s family shelled out more than Rs 8.5 lakh. When the family started getting edgy about the offer, Murray invited them to come to Delhi for the final Visa interview. “It never happened. We came thrice and stayed in a hotel in Paharganj. Murray always told us that he would directly come and see us in our hotel room. But till the last he would postpone his visit,” added Rajan. Through all these months the family was in touch with Mark George over phone—a Nigerian number. George said he was in the UK but was using a Nigerian phone number on roaming. On his last visit to Delhi alone, Praveen went to the UK Embassy and found that no Lawrence Murray worked there. Murray had also stopped picking his phone. He then went to ICICI Bank to check about whereabouts of Diana Dhemnethoi but that too drew a blank. “He realised then it was a fraud. He did not return to Kerala instead went to his brother in Pune. He was too ashamed to tell us that he had been cheated,” added Rajan. Rajan then called George on the number he had. “I had last conversation with him on November 3. He said that they needed another certificate and then my son can join the company on November 3. But I was tired of paying money. So, I asked for refund and he promised to return money in two weeks,” said Rajan. But the family members did not know that time was running out for them. On Sunday, when Rajan, his wife Usha and younger son Vimal were busy with their chores post-breakfast, Praveen hanged himself in his room.
