The Mumbai police on Tuesday booked a 51-year-old man, who tore off pages from his passport to hide his trips to Bangkok, on charges of defrauding immigration officials.
The man was caught by immigration authorities at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport.
According to the immigration officer — Rajiv Ranjan Kumar — who is the complainant in the case, the accused passenger arrived at the immigration counter during early hours of Monday, and submitted his passport and boarding pass.
The immigration officer, while checking his passport, learnt that the passenger had arrived from Indonesia via Vietnam. However, Kumar later discovered that the pages numbered- 17/18, 21/22, 23/24, 25/26 were missing from the passenger’s passport.
Following this, the officer then took the passenger to the wing commander for further inquiry.
During the wing commander’s inquiry into the missing pages, the passenger revealed that he had visited Bangkok around a year ago, and had torn off pages of his passport to hide his trips, according to the FIR.
In the FIR registered, Kumar stated that this was a case of illegal tampering of the passport, leading to a complaint being filed against the passenger with the Sahar police station
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The passenger has been booked under Sections 12 of Passports Act and 318(4) of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS).
© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd