Interstate gang providing fake degrees busted

Tribune News Service

Mohali, February 3

The police have busted an interstate gang of fake education consultants who duped students and parents in the name of providing academic degrees.

The gang used to create false domain names of universities and make fake certificates. They charged up to Rs1.3 lakh from the customers.

The suspects have been identified as Nirmal Singh, alias Nimma of Kartarpur village, Mullanpur Garibdas; Mohali resident Ankit Arora, Mathura resident Vishnu Sharma, Meerut resident Sushant Tyagi and Ghaziabad resident Anand Vikram Singh. The police have recovered a large number of fake degrees, printers, scanners, lamination machines, fake holograms, mobile phones, laptops and cars used in the crime.

A case was registered under Sections 259, 260,420, 465, 467, 468, 469, 470,471, 473 and 120 of the IPC at the Zirakpur police station on January 26.

The suspects had opened study centres at various places in the state under different names and had been operating since 2017. The police said close to 1,000 persons were in contact with them.

The SP (Rural), Ravjot Grewal, and DSP of Zirakpur Amro Singh said the arrests had been made from Mohali, Meerut, Mathura and Delhi. “The suspects have been remanded in police custody for one week and are being questioned. More revelations in the case are likely,”they said.