Siblings held for duping visa aspirants in Ludhiana

A brother-sister duo, who were duping people on the pretext of sending them abroad, has been arrested by the Ludhiana police. The police seized a whopping ~1.07 crore from the accused, which they had collected from the victims.

Police seize ~1.07 cr

• They would lure people with a false promise of sending them abroad
• After receiving fee for visas, they would point out flaws in the documents and tell the applicants that their visas had been rejected
• The Ludhiana police seized ~1.07 cr from them

The arrested accused were identified as Amit Malhotra (39) and his sister Veenu Malhotra (38), residents of Dugri Phase-1.

The accused had also duped a woman police constable from Mohali, who is a part of the chief minister’s security team. Additional DCP Zone-3 Shubham Aggarwal said that Ravneet Kaur, a senior constable from Mohali, recently filed a complaint against the owners of Global Way Immigration, Ishmeet Chowk, Ludhiana. She alleged that despite taking ~14.30 lakh to send her brother and sister-in-law to the UK on study visas, the accused failed to arrange the visas. The accused continued to make promises for four years on one pretext or the other, but failed to arrange the visas and also refused to return the money. A case was registered on September 4. Amit was arrested the same day, while his sister was apprehended the next day.

ADCP Aggarwal asserted that during the preliminary probe, it was found that the accused had duped a number of visa aspirants across the state and cheated them of crores.

Revealing the modus operandi, ADCP Aggarwal said the accused would lure people with a false promise of sending them abroad. After taking fees for the visa, they would point out flaws in the documents and would tell the applicants that their visas had been rejected. Gradually, they embezzled a large amount of money from the victims.

Notably on August 12, protesting against the same firm, a couple, Hardeep Singh and Amandeep Kaur, from Dhuri in Sangrur had climbed atop a watertank in Ludhiana’s Model Town Extension as the duo had duped them of ~10 lakh on the pretext of arranging visas to the UK.