Rachakonda police bust fake certificates racket, arrest three

HYDERABAD: The Rachakonda police Special Operations Team (SOT) has busted a fake educational certificate racket and arrested three persons for circulating fabricated educational certificates of various Universities along with supporting documents.

Miryala Anand Kumar, Mallepaka Hemanth and Shaik Shaheen were selling these fake certificates to people to help them obtain VISAs to travel to the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States (US) and secure jobs in the private sector.

According to the police, the accused were selling fake certificates of prestigious universities such as Osmania University, JNTUH, Andhra University, Acharya Nagarjuna University, Kakatiya University and SRM University besides Telangana State Board of Intermediate Certificates.

The main accused, Anand Kumar, a JNTU graduate with a bachelor's degree in fine arts, who ran a flex designing unit in Chaitanyapuri as a business for a living, was dissatisfied with his meagre earnings.

He devised a scheme to increase his income by fabricating and circulating fictitious academic credentials to youths in need.

Anand Kumar contacted Mallepaka Hemanth and Kalyan, who run educational consultancies in Malakpet and Saroor Nagar respectively. They used information gathered from various colleges on dropouts and failed students, consulted them and their parents. They promised to provide enough educational certificates and other documents to obtain a VISA to travel to the UK/USA and other countries to earn good money.

They came up with forged educational credentials and sold them to VISA applicants, making large sums of money in the process. Anand Kumar used to prepare and print fake educational certificates and other documents at his flex shop using Adobe Photoshop software.

Hemanth Kumar, who has been running an educational consultancy called Ricco Consultancy in Malakpet for the past two years, came in contact with Anand Kumar and began obtaining fake educational certificates from them for which he charged Rs. 2,000 to 3,000 each. He handed over the fake certificates and other documents to needy students after receiving Rs. 50,000 to 60,000 as a package. They collected money from aspirants after they obtained a VISA.

Shaik Shaheen, who works as a visa processing counsellor at Way 4 Overseas consultancy Saroor Nagar, used to contact Anand Kumar and collect prepared and forged educational certificates, which he then handed over to Kalyan, the director of Way 4 Overseas.

For the last two years, Anand Kumar has been providing fake educational certificates to both educational consultancy agencies and students, earning a commission of Rs 2,000 to 3,000 per document.

According to reliable information, on November 22, 2022, the SOT LB Nagar and Chaitanyapuri police conducted a joint operation and raided Anand Kumar's Art Line Arts Flex Design shop located at Sai Nagar Colony, Chaitanyapuri, and apprehended him along with Mallepaka Hemanth. On November 23, 2022, another accused Shaik Shaheen was nabbed near Way 4 Overseas consultancy.

They also seized a large number of fake educational certificates of various universities as well as other fake supporting documents, a computer, scanner, rubber stamps and other incriminating material.

A case was registered in Chaitanyapuri police station under the relevant sections.

Rachakonda police have advised students to be wary of fraudulent overseas and local consultants when applying for VISAs as this could seriously impact their promising careers.