Police conduct raids at offices of immigration agencies in Amritsar

As the crackdown on illegal immigrants in the USA after Donald Trump took over as president brought the focus on the menace of illegal immigration agents in Punjab, the Punjab Police have started a special campaign to verify antecedents of travel agencies operating in the city.

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As many as 131 immigrants from Punjab were deported by the US government on military aircrafts recently out which only 18 victims lodged complaints with the police. The remaining deportees preferred not to file police complaints against fraudster immigration agencies.

The city have around 700 licensed travel agencies out of which nearly 400 are located in the North police sub-division comprising posh localities and the Civil Lines areas.

Arvind Meena, Assistant commissioner of Police, (North), said on Monday, the police raided at least 60 travel agency offices located in the Ranjit Avenue alone. He said discrepancy in documents of eight agencies was found during raids.

“We have asked agency owners to bring their documents tomorrow for further verification. If they are found not complying with the norms, action will be taken accordingly apart from cancelling their licences,” said Meena.

Police Commissioner (CP) Gurpreet Singh Bhullar said a campaign was going on in the entire city and it would continue for next week or two. He said the main aim was to identify illegal immigration agents operating in the city. The raids were conducted in other parts of the city also, the CP said.

It is evident to mention here that the district administration has cancelled licences of more than 30 travel agents who failed to renew their licences for year or more. Besides the police and district administration carried out inspections of licensed travel agencies.