50 candidates held with fake documents at army recruitment

At least 50 candidates were caught on Thursday with fake documents at the Army Recruitment Office (ARO) at Barrackpore in West Bengal during verification for recruitment of soldiers.

The Army termed it as a scam involving touts misleading youths from the northern plains.

The forged documents, including Aadhar cards, educational and birth certificates, address proofs were submitted by candidates from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar falsely mentioning addresses of North 24 Parganas and Hooghly districts, a government release said.

A Defence official said that candidates from Purulia, Bankura, Hooghly and North 24 Parganas districts of West Bengal were supposed to participate in the recruitment rally which is being held at RCTC Stadium, Barrackpore from September 15 to September 20, for which close to 20,000 aspirants had applied.

"There are several touts who are alluring the youths to get them recruited in the Army by adopting unfair means, and the large-scale inter-state fake document racket is highly active in West Bengal and neighbouring states," the Army said.

The ARO Barrackpore in the northern outskirts of Kolkata had issued a recruitment notification for the post of soldier in the categories of technical all arms, technical (ammunition and aviation examiner), nursing assistant, veterinary, general duty, clerk, storekeeper and tradesman.

"During verification of documents, the Army personnel, on close scrutiny found that so far 50 candidates from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar had submitted fake documents like birth certificate, ration ID, Aadhar, voter ID, education certificates and residential certificates mentioning different addresses of North 24 Parganas and Hooghly Districts," a Defence official said.

Recruiting officer Col S Hemanth Nath lodged a complaint with the Barrackpore police to inquire into the matter after seizure of all the fake documents and mobile devices from the candidates.

"The scam seems running deep with touts misleading the candidates from the rural belts of northern plains, with couple of candidates appearing in the rallies across India with the same set of fake documents made to suit each state," the official said.

The candidates said that they had paid sums ranging between Rs 2,000 to Rs 25,000 to agents for getting the fake documents, with an agreement to pay Rs 2 to 4 lakhs on selection.

Many of these candidates were lured by professional touts and were sent to Kolkata in the days or weeks preceding the recruitment rally to prepare the documents and obtain residential proofs.

Senior Army officers said that the candidates repeatedly fall prey to the lure of touts with false assurance to get them enrolled based on fake documents.