Fake passports, false renewal
Organised gangs active near Agargaon office
Mizanur Khan
Each day thousands of passports are being renewed by organised gangs operating within and outside the Department of Passport and Immigration (DPI).Sources at the department said while roughly 75,000 passports are deposited for renewal a year they are issuing eight lakh, a large number of them without proper verification, seals or signatures. Last year the Detective Branch (DB) seized 51 forged Bangladeshi passports with visas, block seals, immigration seals in Old Dhaka. Dollar endorsement seals, 30 block seals of various persons and organisations, embossed seal of Bangladesh government and home ministry, forged Indian, Thai, Turkish, Nepalese and Chinese visa stickers were also recovered. According to highly-placed sources in the department the government is losing around Tk 50 crore passport revenue a year to the gangs. "Passport holders don't go to the department directly but pay the required fee to middlemen (dalals) for renewal of their passports to avoid long queues," he said. It is alleged that brokers prey on unsuspecting people to purchase forms from them even though these are available at selected Sonali Bank branches in the city. If by chance those people end up in the hands of the brokers, then they have to pay extra besides official fees. Brokers however claim they are only trying to help those who cannot fill up the forms. They admit that requirement of having forms attested by a first-class government officer tempts people to deal with them. "That's why applicants tend to seek help from us," said Tabibur Rahman, a broker standing in front of the department. Most brokers have seals to duplicate the signature of higher officials. "Recently we found out that a broker renewed a passport for a client without that person ever needing to come to us," said a passport official. The DPI said the task of screening forged passports is virtually impossible without advanced technology and trained officers. Passport rules also require police to submit an investigation report on the applicants verifying all personal details. But thanks to modest bribe between Tk 200-500 it is easily overcome. "You can virtually buy a report from police," said another person in the passport department.
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