Travel agent, held for duping 3 Canada-bound students, sent to judicial custody

The accused, Veena Amberkar, took ₹3.5 lakh collectively from three students – Hardik Parab, 21, Jainam Gala, 21, and Mukesh Naik, 21 – to book flight tickets for Canada, a police officer said, adding, “After taking the money, she kept giving them details of the bookings and said they were cancelled at the last moment”

Mumbai: A travel agent from Borivali who was booked for allegedly duping three Canada-bound students was sent to judicial custody on Tuesday.

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The accused, Veena Amberkar, took ₹3.5 lakh collectively from three students – Hardik Parab, 21, Jainam Gala, 21, and Mukesh Naik, 21 – to book flight tickets for Canada, a police officer said, adding, “After taking the money, she kept giving them details of the bookings and said they were cancelled at the last moment.”

The complainant, Parab, had applied for a postgraduate course in a Toronto-based college and was supposed to join on September 5. “She took ₹1.3 lakh from me as ticket charges, her commission and some miscellaneous charges. She told me that the ticket would take me from Mumbai to Paris and then to Toronto. A couple of days before I was supposed to get the ticket, she told me that she had rebooked me on another flight as the previous one got cancelled,” Parab told the police.

He added that he finally got the details of his travel on August 2, however, when he logged on to the website of the airlines, he could not find the details there. “The complainant then confronted the agent when she said there were some technical errors that led to the cancellation of his ticket. He then visited her office and asked her to return the money. However, she refused. Parab then learnt that Gala and Naik were duped similarly,” the officer said.

Based on the complaint made on August 18, Ambekar was arrested this weekend. After spending a few days in police custody, she was sent to judicial custody.