BEWARE! Your PAN card or driving licence are
becoming a handy tool for unscrupulous elements to commit identity
frauds in the city.
The photocopies of PAN cards or driving licences with photographs of the
original card-holder being replaced with another are only a tip of the
ice berg of the number of ways being utilised
to submit an application for seeking a wide variety of loans, opening a
savings bank or Demat account by unscrupulous elements.
Take the case of SK Singh, a junior engineer, a resident of C-312
Sector D Mansarovar LDA Colony. Singh was surprised when about a
fortnight back, he received an acknowledgment letter from the main
branch of the State Bank of India thanking him for opening an account
(number 01190116051) with them.
Since he had not opened any such account, the junior engineer taking
it to be a case of mistaken identity approached the bank to clear the
misunderstanding.
To his utter disbelief, he discovered that not only somebody had
opened the account by using his tampered PAN card and cellphone bill but
had also deposited over Rs 3 lakh in it. Singh was aghast when instead
of cooperating the bank authorities reprimanded him for reporting the
matter so late to them. “I told them that since I am presently posted in
Mahoba, I had not seen the acknowledgement letter, which though
received by a member of my family was lying unopened,” he said.
“I then tried to recollect how the forger could have procured my PAN
and cellphone bill. It struck to me that I had attached photocopies of
these documents for opening a Demat account with Sumna, a sub-broker of
Fair Intermediate Investment, a share trading firm, said the junior
engineer.
Subsequent investigations both by the police and Singh himself zeroed
in on one Rohit Singh employed with Sumna. “Rohit not only forged my
documents but also that of one Ratua Watal, a teacher in Awadh
Girls Degree College, as introducer in opening the account in my name
with the SBI,” said Singh. Simultaneously, he also opened a demat
account under my name with Stock Holding Corporation of India at Shri
Ram Towers and with Ventura Securities. He then took the shares of one
of the customer of the firm (one DN Agarwal) and got them transferred in
my name from the Stockholding Corporation and sold them through Ventura
Securities for Rs 3.09 lakh and deposited the cheque with the SBI
account, recounts Singh.
The city’s broking houses have their own stories to tell: “We had
lodged an FIR against two persons some months back in the city who were
caught with photocopies of fake driving licenses attached to the
document for opening a Demat account with one of the share depository
participants in the city. The original driving license belonged to one
of our clients. The photocopy of the card had the photo tampered with to
submit fake documents”, Nitin Saxena, Vice President Karvy Stock
Broking Ltd, Lucknow told HT.
It is not just this grave issue of photocopies of PAN cards or
driving licenses being tampered, the problem is compounded by people who
might present a fake PAN card and driving license which look so “real”
on verification. The only solution to deal with such a problem is to
implement the system of “biometrics” (using fingerprints as identity)
to check all kinds of identity frauds, he said.
The Income Tax Department had now rigorously started physical
verification of proof of residence of all applicants applying for new
PAN cards in the city. The scam related to multiple Demat accounts being
opened by a single person in Ahmedabad had now prompted the Income Tax
Department to issue cards only after proper physical verification of
applicant’s proof of residence”, Saxena added.
“Various types of frauds are committed by people using PAN cards of
the assesses not only in UP but across the country. We would certainly
investigate cases of “photocopies of PAN cards” which had been tampered
with in any application be it opening of bank accounts or applying for a
loan. The people who have been victims of identity frauds could come
to the Income Tax Department and report such cases in writing to the
senior officials for action”, a senior IT official told HT.
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