The vigilance team of Western Railway has busted a fake recruitment racket on the basis of information received from sources. “On February 2, 2024, the team busted a fake racket that had defrauded more than 300 candidates of about Rs 21 crore. The team had been chasing this fake racket for three months,” said an official of Western Railway.

According to Sumit Thakur, chief public relations officer of Western Railway, a trap was set to nab the culprit Hartali Prasad Rohidas, the mastermind behind fake recruitment racket with the railways. With the help of an outsider and two proxy candidates, Rs 20,000 was transferred to the culprit through Google Pay. It was planned to meet accused Rohidas at Mumbai Central Station for payment of further instalment. At around 2 pm on February 2, he was finally nabbed at porch of Mumbai Central Station.

On investigation, accused Rohidas revealed that he had collected Rs 9-10 lakh per candidate. He was making fake documents with the help of a person based in Kolkata. A total of 180 blocked numbers were found in his smart phone, probably those were the people who had given huge amount to get a job in Railways.

“The team detected about 120 chats of the persons demanding their money back (ranging from Rs 5-8 lakhs) which were given to him for getting government jobs” said an official of WR adding that all the fake documents, chats and videos of recruited staff has been recovered.

“Legal proceedings have been initiated against him, underscoring WR’s commitment to upholding integrity and safeguarding its recruitment processes. The accused has been handed over to GRP Mumbai Central and FIR has been registered under section 420, 465, 468, 470 and 471of IPC,” said an official.