At least a dozen job seekers have been duped of Rs 22.80 lakh in the latest immigration scam in Chandigarh. The victims, hailing from Chandigarh and various cities in Punjab, were promised work visas mainly for Dubai and Singapore. The immigration scam took place in August-September 2021.
The police has booked an immigration agency, Sparx Overseas in Sector 34, for cheating and also under Section 24 of the Immigration Act. Five victims, who wanted to go to Singapore, had paid Rs 1.20 lakh each and Rs 45,000 each were paid by seven victims for Dubai visas. In addition, they were all charged Rs 3,500 each for their medical examinations, police said. Apart from this, the victims paid more money to get their foreign visas, totalling Rs 22.8 lakh.
While Harmesh Singh, Nirmal Singh, Harjinder Singh, Balwinder Singh and Hari Harvinder Kumar had paid money for visas to Singapore, Jaspal Singh, Kulwinder Singh, Parvinder Singh, Gurparbhjeet Singh, Kishan Singh, Ajit Jha and Roshan Sharma had allegedly paid for visas to Dubai.
In their complaints to the police, the victims said they had seen lucrative advertisements of Sparx Overseas on social media, which made them approach the company for work visas. Victim Kishan, a resident of Sector 49, said that he, along with other victims, found the mobile phones of all the employees of the immigration company switched off on September 10. He reported that they all visited the office of the immigration company in Sector 34 the next day and found only a security guard there, who informed them that the employees of the company had not come for the past three days. A case was registered.
