Hyderabad: The Special Branch has found 10 cases of passports that were issued based on fake identity documents in the city.
An Aadhaar card, birth certificate issued by GHMC, or Class X certificate, are mandatory to define the age of the candidate. A bogus birth certificate is available for as little as Rs 5,000, and now there are experts at falsifying Aadhaar cards too.
A source revealed, “The GHMC issues birth certificates based on an affidavit issued by the collector’s office. There are agents who ‘manage’ the staff inside the collectorate to get such certificates. The computer operators at GHMC charge between Rs 5,000 and Rs 10,000 per birth certificate. Even persons not born in the city can get a birth certificate from the GHMC stating home delivery.”
Obtaining a passport by submitting forged certificates is not a rare occurrence. Some people have managed to get a second passport, too, where the proof of address and age, and other identification documents are different.
The verification is coordinated between the officials of the special branch and the agents, and the report is submitted to the regional passport office.
