A major interstate racket involving alleged forging of disability certificates to facilitate admissions under the PwD category has been busted by the Delhi Police, with nine people apprehended and 27 certificates recovered, an officer said on Thursday.
Police unearthed the network after receiving information about a man allegedly facilitating admissions to JBT, B.Tech and other undergraduate courses by arranging forged Persons with Disabilities (PwD) certificates for money, she said.
“The investigation began with the apprehension of Lalit Kumar alias Aditya (36), a resident of Aligarh, currently residing in Faridabad, on August 31. Sixteen PwD certificates issued by government hospitals in Badaun, Bareilly and Siddharth Nagar in Uttar Pradesh, pertaining to hearing impairment, locomotor disability and low vision, were recovered from him, along with three mobile phones and a laptop,” the officer said.
A case was registered at the Maurice Nagar police station.
During interrogation, Lalit allegedly disclosed that he worked with education consultants, including Roshan Kumar of Noida, to collect students’ personal details and arrange forged certificates. Their Aadhaar addresses were allegedly manipulated using AI tools to show addresses in districts including Siddharth Nagar, Badaun, Bareilly and Gorakhpur before applications were uploaded on the Unique Disability ID (UDID) portal.
The certificates were allegedly arranged through associates for Rs 20,000-Rs 30,000 each, police said.
Roshan, who runs a consultancy in Sector 18, Noida, was apprehended on September 1. He allegedly collected students’ Aadhaar details, photographs, signatures and OTPs and shared them with Lalit for processing applications on the UDID portal.
Kuldeep (28), a contractual computer operator working with the Divyang office at the CMO in Bareilly, was arrested on September 3. Police seized his mobile phone and a desktop allegedly used to prepare forged medical reports, which were subsequently uploaded on the portal.
“Sher Singh Solanki (40) and Dr Laxmi Kant Saxena (60) — a member of the Bareilly disability board — were also apprehended. Financial transactions between the accused were found during investigation,” the officer said, without elaborating further on Solanki’s role.
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Jai Prakash Shukla (48), a senior malaria inspector posted at the Divyang office in Siddharth Nagar, was arrested on September 10. He allegedly misused his position to facilitate certificates bearing Siddharth Nagar addresses in exchange for money, according to the officer.
The officer said Shukla’s acquaintance Surendra Rastogi (33) was subsequently apprehended on September 19 after investigators traced several financial transactions through his bank account, police said.
Adesh Singh (26) was arrested from Sitapur on September 12. Nine disability certificates were recovered from his residence in Lucknow, while Dhirender Kumar Pandey (32), a junior assistant at the CMO office in Deoria, was apprehended on September 18 for allegedly preparing forged certificates and handing them over to an associate for Rs 5,000 each.
Police said a search is underway for Chandan Singh Yadav of Gorakhpur, who allegedly had contacts at government hospitals in Gorakhpur and Deoria. The investigation is examining the role of doctors posted at the hospitals, as well as the students in whose names the certificates were issued, the officer said.
According to police, besides 27 forged disability certificates, they recovered a laptop, a MacBook, a desktop, 11 mobile phones containing chats related to the certificates, Rs 75,000 in cash and a Mercedes car.
