Bidhannagar Police unearth fake admission racket, 3 arrested

Kolkata: The Bidhannagar City Police unearthed a nationwide racket that would cheat aspirants with false promises of providing admissions to medical colleges and arrested three persons in this connection. The trio were apprehended on Friday night from an apartment at Chinar Park on the basis of a case that was initiated at Bidhannagar Cyber Crime Police station on November 3. The total cheated amount across the country would run into a few crores.

The arrested persons — Ranjan Kumar Panda, Sanjay Kumar Dash and Rajesh Kumar Dash — all hail from Jajpur, Odisha.

Many gadgets, forged documents and bank-related documents have been seized from their possession.

According to a senior official of the Cyber Crime Police, one Naveen Chandra, a resident of Patna had come in contact with one of the accused, Rajesh, at the office of a private educational council situated at Salt Lake Sector V.

Rajesh had lured Naveen with false promises of making arrangements for his son's admission at KIMS Medical College in Bengaluru.

Naveen had paid more than Rs 11 lakh to Rajesh in two monthly installments in August and September respectively but after a month, it was found that the office of the education council was fake.

According to the investigators, there are a number of medical aspirants who have been duped in a similar manner.

All of those who have been cheated have paid at least Rs 11 lakh to the gang.

Police further informed that among the trio nabbed, Ranjan is a B. Com, Sanjay a BA while Rajesh has a diploma of Fitter and all the three are very well conversed in English.

"We have every reason to believe that there are more people involved in the racket. We will definitely grill them for more leads," a senior official of Bidhannagar City Police's detective department said.