This was the third arrest in the fake certificate case in Telangana, which came to light late last month. A fourth suspect is absconding.
The arrested was identified as M Mallikarjuna Gandhi, an employee of an IT company in the Gachibowli area of the city. (Creative Commons)
The Rachakonda Police in Hyderabad on Tuesday, 13 July, arrested an absconding man suspected of procuring fake educational certificates, even as they continue to search for another suspect: the alleged supplier.
This takes the total number of arrests to three in the case. The police apprehended two suspects on 24 June.
The arrested was identified as M Mallikarjuna Gandhi, an employee of an IT company in the Gachibowli area of the city.
A senior police officer said, “The hunt for the fourth suspect, Brijesh Tiwari, is still going on.”
The Saroornagar police have booked Gandhi under IPC Sections 420 (cheating), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating), 471 (dishonestly using a document as genuine), and 34 (acts done by several people with common intention).
He has been sent to judicial remand for 15 days.
Suspect M Mallikarjuna Gandhi was absconding and was arrested by the Rachakonda Police. (Supplied)
According to the police, Gandhi obtained fake graduation certificates from counterfeiter Palagoni Srinivas, who is already in police custody.
The education certificates were from the Himalayan University in Itanagar, Arunachal Pradesh.
The cops seized, in total, four forged educational certificates and one mobile phone from Gandhi.
“Gandhi paid ₹75,000 to Srinivas for the fake documents, procured to apply for work in reputed companies,” the Rachakonda Police said.
The Special Operations Team of the LB Nagar and Saroornagar police conducted a joint raid on 24 June this year at a flat in Srikrishna Nagar in Dilsukhnagar.
The police arrested Srinivas (53), director of an educational institute, and KV Mallikarjuna Rao (51), who wanted to procure a fake degree certificate for his daughter.
“Rao paid ₹90,000 to Srinivas for the fake certificate,” the police said.
The police charged them under the same IPC sections as Gandhi, and they were sent to judicial custody.
According to the cops, Srinivas and his accomplice Tiwari used to provide forged educational certificates for about ₹1 lakh.
“Both the suppliers intended to earn easy money,” the police said.
The arrest comes close on the heels of another fake educational certificate racket busted — this time on 5 July — by the Rachakonda Police, who arrested four people, including a software engineer, in connection with the case.
The police seized more than 100 fake certificates of various reputed universities from the gang.
The institutions included Kakatiya University, Jawaharlal Nehru Technical University, Acharya Nagarjuna University, Satavahana University, MS Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences in Bengaluru, Anna University in Chennai, and Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapith in Varanasi.
According to the police, the gang used to operate from an overseas education consultancy located at Chaitanyapuri, and targeted youngsters who sought shortcuts to go abroad.
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