Engineer, DU graduate among three arrested by Delhi Police for running fake govt jobs racket

The accused used to charge ₹6 lakh from each aspirant. A few appointment letters and blank identity cards, fake stamps of the Railways and other departments were recovered from the accused, police said.

Delhi Police’s crime branch has busted a fake job recruitment racket and arrested three men, including a civil engineer and a Delhi university graduate, who had cheated a number of people in Delhi, Bihar, Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana, on the pretext of getting them permanent jobs in the Railways, Food Corporation of India, military engineering, India Post and nationalised banks.

The main accused was identified as Sandeep Sidhana, a graduate from Delhi University’s Khalsa College. Police identified Sidhana’s associates as Shashi Bhushan alias Manish, from Samastipur in Bihar and Sheetal Kumar, from Bihar’s Madhubani. (HT Photo)

The accused used to charge ₹6 lakh from each aspirant. A few appointment letters and blank identity cards, fake stamps of the Railways and other departments were recovered from the accused, police said.

The main accused was identified as Sandeep Sidhana (36), a graduate from Delhi University’s Khalsa College, who lives in Delhi’s New Manglapuri. He was arrested previously in 2005 in a case of theft. Police identified Sidhana’s associates as Shashi Bhushan alias Manish (26) from Samastipur in Bihar and Sheetal Kumar (30) from Bihar’s Madhubani.

Police said while Kumar is a BTech in civil engineering from a university in Chennai, Bhushan came to Delhi in 2012 in search of a government job and, on not getting one, joined Sidhana’s gang to earn easy money.

“During the investigation, we found that a gang, headed by the suspect Manish, who is also known as Shashi Bhushan, has cheated these men. We learnt that Bhushan had fled to Bihar and a police team was sent after him. He was arrested on August 5 from Patna, Bihar. At his instance, his aides Sidhana and Sheetal Kumar were arrested from Saket and Sarai Kale Khan in Delhi, respectively,” Ranjan said, adding that Bhushan’s brother, Manoj, who is also a member of the gang, is yet to be arrested.

Police found that Bhushan and Manoj used to lure candidates and introduced them to Sidhana who posed as their “boss”.

“The candidates were then promised government job in the Railways, banks and other government departments. A fee of ₹50,000 was charged from each candidate to initiate the hiring process and they were given a bundle of forms to fill,” the additional commissioner said.

Ranjan said the trio also conducted a fake medical examination of the candidates with the help of another aide, Sanjay, who is also on the run.

“Sanjay took the applicants to the Northern Railway Hospital for their medical examination and a blood test was done. The candidates were then given a medical clearance certificate and a temporary ID card. They were charged an additional sum of ₹5.5 lakh. A short computer course was arranged for these aspirants while the accused fled and changed their contact numbers,” the officer said.