Hyderabad: The sleuths of LB Nagar zone Special Operation Team (SOT), along with Saroornagar police, arrested six persons, including a supplier and five fake educational certificate holders, and seized 64 fake certificates of various universities.
According to the police, the accused were selling fake certificates, ranging from SSC, intermediate, degree, BTech, of universities in Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka, collecting between Rs 1 lakh to Rs 3.50 lakh.
During the interrogation, the prime accused, Mohammed Afroz, a resident of Rajendranagar who was arrested at Doctor’s Colony, Saroornagar, confessed that he is presently posted as an assistant manager in ISBM, Banjara Hills, along with Ashu alias Saddam (absconding) from New Delhi, who used to supply fake educational certificates.
Saddam offered a good share of the amount for promoting the needy persons who are interested in obtaining fake educational certificates.
The accused were charging Rs 1 lakh for a fake graduation degree certificate and Rs 3.50 lakh for BTech and other degrees, police said.
Afroz managed to collect information on dropouts and failed students who consulted him at his workplace and opted for other sources to sell them fake certificates and other documents to get visas to the UK, US, and other countries, police said. He confessed to the police that he, along with the other accused, sold fake certificates to 50 students near Doctors Colony Arch under the limits of Saroornagar police station, and the police could seize them.
“Students who buy forged educational certificates to get visas to go to foreign countries and to get placements in IT and the private sector are advised to be careful about bogus overseas or local consultants and not to indulge in getting fake educational certificates,” police said.
The other accused, Kadari Manikanta, Yelati Ratna Kishore, Putlagari Susheel Kumar, Shahbaaz Ali Khan, and Avucherla Balakrishna, who were arrested, are certificate holders.
Police seized 64 fake certificates and six mobile phones from the accused and produced them before the court, a press release issued by Rachakonda police PRO stated.
