Kolkata, Dec 16 (IANS): The rackets operating in West Bengal and engaged in arranging for fake passports for illegal Bangladeshi infiltrators are following the same pattern and modus operandi of carrying out their operations, an investigation by the state police has revealed.
Sources aware of the development said that the first common pattern is that the bases of such rackets are mainly villages adjacent to the international borders, both land and coastal, with Bangladesh.
The second common pattern, sources said, is in the step-by-step modus operandi in arranging for the fake passports. Whenever the information of any Bangladesh infiltrator entering India by illegally crossing the borders reached the kingpins of such rackets, their agents first contacted those infiltrators.
Those expressing willingness to pay substantial amounts for getting the fake passport were first arranged accommodation at any safe house in any of the bordering villages. Thereafter, first, the other Indian identity documents, starting with ration cards and followed by other documents like Aadhaar cards, EPIC cards and PAN cards followed.
The final step, sources said, was making arrangements for fake passports. The entire process used to cost an amount of between Rs 2,00,000 and Rs 3,00,000.
On Sunday only the cops of the coastal police division of West Bengal Police arrested two kingpins of such a racket namely Samaresh Biswas and Deepak Mondal, the latter being a contractual staff with the Indian Postal Department.
His son Ripon Mondal was also arrested earlier by the state police. On Sunday a district court in West Bengal remanded Biswas and Mondal to police custody till December 20.
Sources said that their modus operandi of function was exactly identical to a similar racket operating from Indo-Bangladesh bordering Nadia district which arranged for the fake passport of former Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) activist Selim Matabbar, who was arrested from a hotel in Park Street area in central Kolkata recently.
These fake passport rackets operating in different parts of West Bengal, especially in the districts having borders with Bangladesh have become a major headache for the intelligence and security agencies with apprehensions of a rise in illegal immigration amid the ongoing crisis in Bangladesh.