Six held for using forged visa stamps to get US visas

Published : Friday, 20 January, 2023 at 9:20 PM Count : 1557

Six persons were arrested from different parts of Dhaka early Thursday allegedly for using forged tourist visas of a number of countries in passports to secure United States' visas.

Six persons have been arrested allegedly for using forged tourist visas of a number of countries in passports to secure United States' visas.

They were arrested after a US Embassy official filed a case with the Gulshan Police Station in Dhaka on January 18.

The arrested are Palash Chandra Das, Wahid Uddin, Mahbubur Rahman Khan, Shafiqul Islam Sumon, Abu Zafar, and Arifur Rahman.

A team of the Cyber and Special Crime (North) Division of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) arrested them conducting drives at different parts of the capital on early Thursday. At that time, four forged seals and three passports were seized from their possession.

Gulshan Police Station officer-in-charge ABM Farman Ali said some of the arrested fraudsters tried to obtain US visas for themselves, while others tried to secure visas for another person.

In his case, the embassy official concerned mentioned that Palash Chandra Das did his visa processing through an agency called 'Travellers' Diary' at Rahmania International Complex at Motijheel, while Mahbubur Rahman did the same thing through another agency, named 'Happy Holidays.'

Mentioning the names and passport numbers of several persons, the plaintiff mentioned that the accused wanted to obtain US visas in fraudulent ways using the forged visa stamps of the countries which they had never visited. Legal measures against the accused were sought in the case.

Earlier on November 12 last, Palash Chandra Das, who hails from village Dakkhin Sahadevpur in Feni district, appeared at the US Embassy in Dhaka along with his passport. Examining Palash's passport, embassy officials concerned found forged visa stamps of visiting Maldives on page number 13 and Malaysia on page number 20. They got surprised witnessing forged visa stamps.

In the same way, Mahbubur Rahman Khan, who hails from village Housedi Durgabodi in Madaripur district, went to the US Embassy to appear at a visa interview on November 3 last. The embassy officials also detected Cambodia's forged visa stamp on page number 9 and Maldives visa stamp on page number 11 in his passport.

Mohammad Milon, who lives at Fatulla area in Narayanganj, went to the US Embassy for visa interview on September 18 last. A forged visa stamp of Maldives was also detected in his passport.

After detecting forged visa stamps in the passports of several other US visa seekers, the embassy authorities went to Gulshan Police Station and filed the case.

Later, the Detective Branch of DMP arrested six persons analysing the case statement.

Quoting an official of the US Embassy, Mohammad Tareque Bin Rashid, deputy commissioner of DB's Cyber and Special Crime Division, said they have passports of many visa seekers which contained visas of different countries, and in and out seals. They expressed suspicion over the matter. "They we launched an investigation and found that the visa stamps of those countries were forged," he said.

He said some agencies have been using forged visa seals to increase the 'significance of passports.' They thought that those forged visas would never be scrutinised. The agencies involved in visa forgery often made contracts with the visa seekers and charge each of them Tk 20 lakh to Tk 30 lakh for sending to different countries including the US, Italy and France. Many people are being lured to their traps.

END/SZA