Hyderabad: Railway Protection Force nabs gang for using fake VIP letterheads to secure Emergency Quota berths

Malkajgiri: The Railway Protection Force (RPF) post at Malkajgiri on Tuesday bust a gang of two persons for manipulating with fake letterheads of MPs/MLAs of various States and sending requests for confirmation of berths under the VIP/Emergency Quota.

The scam came to light on a suspicion raised by the SCR officials in the Emergency Quota (EQ) Cell when they were receiving repeated requests on letterheads of MPs/MLAs belonging to Goa, Maharashtra, UP, Orissa, Kerala.

Based on information gathered by the RPF Cyber Cell, joint teams of Crime Investigation Branch, Hyderabad, and RPF Malkajgiri swung into action and nabbed Dilip Nayak (33) at IDA Bollaram.

During questioning, he informed the RPF team that he got acquainted with Mukesh Chouhan, who used fake letterheads of MPs/MLAs for confirming waitlisted tickets. For this Chouhan was charging money. Since then, the RPF team was on the hunt for the absconding Chouhan, said senior SCR officer.

The RPF team nabbed Chouhan, who was running a shop of booking railway tickets unauthorisedly here. During raids, the team has seized 84 used tickets valued at Rs 166,476 from the duo and registered a case under the Railways Act. They were allegedly downloading the letterheads of MPs/MLAs from the internet, forging contents, and using them for confirming berths under VIP Quota.

Gajanan Mallya, SCR General Manager, complemented the RPF team for unearthing the scam and detention of criminals. He advised it to continue to maintain strict vigil to ensure that passengers have a hassle-free journey.