The international airport in Bangalore, the third busiest in the country, appears to be a safe transit point for passengers using passports that have been tampered with or are forged, if the number of cases booked by the city police in this regard is any indication.
During the last two weeks, eight passengers were detained at the Bengaluru International Airport (BIA) for allegedly possessing forged passports.
The BIA, which opened about 20 months ago, is equipped with highly advanced safety and security gadgets. “The Bangalore airport is regarded as a safe point of departure or disembarkation with fake passports. There is a notion that the BIA still does not have advanced gadgets to screen fake passports,” Deputy Commissioner of Police (Intelligence) V.S. D’Souza told The Hindu.
Though the country has international airports in New Delhi, Chennai, Mumbai, Kolkata, and Hyderabad, people with fake passports appear to prefer BIA, said a police official in whose jurisdiction the airport falls.
On an average, 60 passengers are deported from Singapore, Malaysia, Dubai, Germany, America, France, Hong Kong and other countries to BIA every year for possessing fake passports, fake visas and other documents.
“They are sent back to their point of boarding. Even Sri Lankans are among them in large numbers,” he said.
However, an official of the Emigration Division at BIA claimed that instances of fake passports were coming to light only because of the advanced equipment installed at the airport. The official blamed the Police Department for its inability to check the menace.
“We are taking a serious note of the rise in fake passport cases. We will verify the documents and efforts will be made to solve all registered cases,” DCP (Crime) S.N. Sidramappa said. The police said people with criminal background and over-staying foreigners flock to agents in Chennai in Tamil Nadu and in Mallapuram and other parts of Kerala, where a thriving fake passport racket existed.
Stolen passports are believed to be used in the racket. “The agents can replace the photograph of a person, who wants to fly, but cannot change other details.
They are using advanced machines to replace the photos. It is difficult to check the authenticity of the forged passport. Only sophisticated scanners and other equipment can detect the manipulation,” a police officer said.
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