Mumbai: Man tries flying to London on fake documents, booked

Mumbai: The Sahar police on Wednesday registered a criminal offence against a man who was allegedly trying to fly to London from the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA) on the basis of a forged joining letter from a non-existent shipping company.

Mr Ramashankar Tripathi, the complainant in the case, works as an immigration assistant at the Bureau of Immigration office at CSMIA. He was on duty at the departure cell when a passenger who was supposed to fly to London came to his counter. Mr Tripathi checked his passport, seaman book, ship joining letter and e-migrate clearance letter.

The passenger, who hails from Thanjavur in Tamil Nadu, told the immigration officials that a London-based agent had made all travel document arrangements for him. Verification of the documents furnished by the passenger revealed that the shipping company whose joining letter he had provided was non-existent and the letter itself was forged, police said.

The immigration officials then informed the Sahar police about the incident and got an offence registered against the passenger. On Thursday, a criminal offence in this regard was registered under sections 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 465 (forgery), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating) and 471 (using as genuine a forged document or electronic record) of the Indian Penal Code. The police are probing if there is an illegal human trafficking racket in play.