E-Paper
Query about residential address leads to woman’s arrest for traveling on fake passport
A 22-year-old woman was arrested at Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport for traveling with a fake passport. She has been booked for cheating and forgery.
MUMBAI: A 22-year-old woman travelling using a fake passport was arrested when she was not able to answer questions about her locality in Thane, where she claimed to live, according to her documents to the immigration officer at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport. She has been booked for cheating and forgery.
The accused, Pooja Badal Mehta, was supposed to board a London-bound flight on Wednesday afternoon. When her documents were being screened before boarding, she was not able to answer questions regarding her locality in Thane West, listed as the address on her passport when the issuing officer decided to exchange pleasantries with her, said an officer from Sahar police.
Suspicious of her ignorance about the locality, immigration officers took her aside for interrogation. “On being asked specific questions about the topography of the locality, as well as of Mumbai in general, she seemed stumped and was not able to give correct answers. The documents said her name was Rakhiben Kamlesh, a resident of Thane. However, her real name is Pooja Badal Mehta, and she is a resident of Valsad, Gujarat,” said the officer.
He further said that the accused already holds a passport issued in her home state. She could not get a visa for the United Kingdom on that passport. When the officials were convinced that the woman was traveling with a forged passport on an assumed identity, they handed her over to the police for further action.
“She then got a new passport issued under a fake identity from Mumbai in November 2022. It showed her residential address as Lokmanya Nagar in Thane West. She was also able to get a visa on it. We are now looking for the agent who helped her get this fake passport,” said an officer.
Further interrogation of the accused revealed that she was looking to migrate to the UK. The police arrested Poojaben Mehta under sections 419 (cheating), 420 (cheating and dishonestly), 465 (punishment for forgery), 468 (forgery), 471(forged document) of the Indian Penal Code and section 12 of the Indian Passport Act.
