Indian intelligence unearths Nepali passport forgery racket in New Delhi: By Gopal Khanal NEW DELHI, May 6 - The Indian intelligence agency Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has uncovered a racket of Nepali passport forgers active in the Indian capital New Delhi. Investigations have shown that the gang has already distributed fake Nepali passports to Indians, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis aside from Nepalis. The forgery racket had come to light after the CBI arrested linchpin of the racket Dharma Raj poudel a week ago. The CBI had launched an investigation following the airing of a sting operation by an Indian news channel into easily accessible fake Nepali passports. The Indian intelligence agency also recovered four fake Nepali passports from Poudel. It has said that terrorists, underworld overlords and thousands others could have already gotten their hands on such forged Nepali passports. One among the four confiscated passports has the picture of Zahir Iqbal Misty, who had masterminded the 1999 hijacking of IEC 814 airplane with the name altered. The other three have been issued to the name of Basanta Kumar Lakhe by the District Administration Office (DAO) Lalitpur, Om Prasad Poudel from DAO Morang and Dharma Raj Poudel Chhetri from DAO Rupandehi. The name on the passport bearing the picture of hijacker Misty, issued by the DAO Kathmandu on July 14, 2004 however, reads Sudeep Khandekar. It was forged over a period of two days for a fee of Rs 30,000. ASP R.S. Dhankar and DSP K.S. Thakur of the CBI have been assigned the investigation into the forgery racket and its leader Poudel. "He (Poudel) has given some important information regarding the gang's accomplices and sources in Kathmandu and New Delhi, based on which we have launched an investigation into the racket," CBI sources said. Investigations has also revealed that Poudel possessed fake stamps of a large number of Nepali authorities that issue passports and equipment to break open laminations. "It appears that by simply replacing the photo, passports issued by whichever agencies can be forged," acting ambassador to India at the Nepalese embassy in New Delhi Tara Prasad Pokhrel told Kantipur. An interesting facet to the case is the fact that it is mostly the Indians that are trying to get forged Nepali passports. The passports with the names Om Prasad Poudel and Basanta Kumar were issued to Indian citizens and that both are in the CBI's contact. The CBI has said that investigations would be launched into the both of them. According to the CBI, fees for the forgery services differ for Indians, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis. Poudel had told the CBI that the standard fee for a forged Nepali passport for Indian citizens was IC Rs 25,000, while it was IC Rs 50,000 for Bangladeshis and Pakistanis. The Indian immigrations officials first got suspicious after passports with photos changed, smudgy signatures, careless scratching out of text and mistakes in the spellings of the agency that issued the passport began popping up which led the officials to arrest such passport holders and send them to embassy officials. "Between mid-March and mid-April, 23 passports were tested for authenticity by the immigration officers. Such cases arise at the same rate in the rest of the months," third secretary at the Nepali consular office in New Delhi Jaya Bahadur Rai said. Investigations have revealed that the racket is more active in nations with lenient visa regulations and in major out-bound transits like Delhi, Mumbai and Thailand. Sex change, the forged-passport way Meanwhile, the passport forgers’ gang and those involved in human trafficking have been found to change the gender of the person while distributing fake passports to them. A lady was arrested at the Indira Gandhi International Airport while travelling with a fake passport. Her fake passport, which earlier belonged to one Rajkumar Limbu, had been tampered with and the owner’s photo replaced by her own. The name on the passport—Rajkumar Limbu—had also been changed to Rajkumari Limbu to suit the gender of its new owner. Likewise, it was found that manpower agents and passport forgers often returned their customers fake passports in return of their original ones. Foreign Ministry demands answers; embassy expresses concern After the Nepali embassy’s name was brought up in the racket, the foreign ministry has asked the embassy officials to provide details of the racket. The embassy on Friday submitted a detailed report regarding the whole scam to the ministry. The CNNIBN—a television channel—quoting the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said that there could be possible involvement of the counselor and other officials of the embassy in the fake passport racket. “The embassy expresses deep concern over such a news,” the acting ambassador Pokhrel said, adding, “It was a condemnable act to put on a news flash disgracing any foreign agency”. The embassy faxed a detailed report to the ministry after a meeting with the concerned officials of the news channel and CBI. First Secretary of the Counselor section Deepak Adhikari and Third Secretary Rai had taken information from CBI officials regarding the involvement of the embassy in the scam. http://www.kantipuronline.com/kolnews.php?&nid=108785 current Nepal - Minister for Foreign Affairs Sahana Pradhan