CBI probe against MEA officials for issuing forged IDs
THE INCIDENT TOOK PLACE AT US EMBASSY ON MARCH 14 DURING A VISA INTERVIEW WHEN FOUR PEOPLE CLAIMED THEY WERE GOVT OFFICIALS SEEKING NONIMMIGRANT VISAS
A group of 10 Indian citizens, posing as officials of the Arunachal Pradesh (AP) government, allegedly travelled to the United States last December using forged passports.
This came to light after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) registered a criminal case against unknown officials of the ministry of external affairs (MEA) for allegedly issuing passports to people on the basis of forged documents and presenting them as Arunachal government officials.
The CBI suspects it to be a case of trafficking and has now filed an FIR under sections for criminal misconduct by public servants, conspiracy, trafficking of persons, cheating, forgery, fraud, and knowingly obtaining official passport by furnishing false information.
The incident took place at the US Embassy here on March 14 during a visa interview with US officials when four people -- who identified themselves as Benjamin Pangkam, Mokar Basar, Lee Ete and Mitali Wangjin -- entered the embassy premises. The four claimed they were government officials seeking non-immigrant visas for the USA.
But after questioning from the US authorities, the four revealed that they were not government employees and had taken false identities to enter the US. They revealed their real names as Tenzin, Tsering Dorget, Tenzin Wangchuk and Yang Chen; they also told the US authorities their real dates of birth, which were different from the ones provided in the passports.
The case got murkier when the four disclosed how they came to possess the forged passports and other stories of individuals before them who had applied for US visas and travelled abroad on multiple occasions.
The CBI said that it received information about unknown MEA officials conniving with four persons, named Raja Kipa, Thupten, Kalden Kunseng and Lucky Mughato, fraudulently issuing passports to 12 people. Those 12 had applied for visas on March 9 and presented their official passports along with letters purportedly written by the MEA to the US consulate in Kolkata.
“All of them were called for the visa interview but only four persons appeared for the interview at the US Embassy on March 14, along with identity cards, posing as government officials of the state of Arunachal Pradesh,” the FIR read.
After the four were exposed, they named Kipa, Thupten, Kunseng and Mughato, and claimed they had paid the accused lakhs to get passports. Mughato apparently even accompanied them to the embassy and provided fake ID cards of the Arunachal government.Probe documents also show that of the 12 persons who were to be present at the embassy here, six who did not appear for interviews had previously applied for visas with other identities and Indian passports.