Mumbai: In a major crackdown on a forged birth and death certificate racket, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday conducted search operations at nine locations in Malegaon, Maharashtra, uncovering a network allegedly involving government officials, middlemen, and illegal immigrants. The case revolves around the large-scale issuance of fraudulent documents used primarily by Bangladeshi nationals to secure Indian identity.
The searches were confined to Malegaon and targeted the premises of government officials, private individuals, and several local agents who acted as intermediaries, helping applicants submit fraudulent applications in exchange for bribes. During the operation, ED officials discovered that one agent’s bank account was exclusively used to collect money through UPI payments and cash deposits. The ED suspects that this account was used to gather bribes on behalf of the then Naib Tehsildar of Malegaon Tehsil for issuing delayed birth certificates. The search also extended to the Naib Tehsildar's premises; however, he was not at home when the ED team conducted the search.
The ED team also conducted the search operation at one of the key individuals Tawab Sheikh's residential premises, who is also one of the 41 accused in the fake birth certificate case. According to ED officials, the ED’s action follows an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) registered on charges of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), after multiple FIRs were lodged by the Maharashtra Police across districts including Akola, Amravati, Nashik Rural, Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar, Latur, and Parbhani. The scam allegedly involves the use of forged Aadhaar cards, ration cards, school certificates, and other identity documents to obtain delayed birth or death certificates.
According to the Malegaon Police's FIRs, which are now also being probed by the ED to ascertain money laundering, as many as 3,127 delayed birth certificates were issued between August 2023 and December 2024, indicating a highly organized operation involving beneficiaries, agents, and forgers. Investigators discovered that required documents for issuing delayed certificates were not sourced from municipal offices but instead from forged certificates bearing the signatures of government officials, submitted to the Tehsil Office for processing.
The registered FIRs suggest that applicants, many of whom are named as accused, used fraudulent identity documents to support their delayed Birth Certificate issued with such fake credentials. In several cases, forged Aadhaar cards, which were manipulated to match their intended false birth registration details. Several cases also showed a trend where individuals applied for multiple birth certificates with different details, indicating an organised effort to bypass the established verification procedures, for this purpose. The police and ED are also probing about the Bangladeshi nationals involved in securing these certificates to establish their Indian identity.
The FIRs also allege that, to obtain delayed birth certificates, applicants commonly used fake endorsements from school authorities or government officials to manipulate the required details. Some applicants even managed to acquire forged signatures or seals of competent authorities. In some cases, applicants submitted certificates from educational institutions that either did not exist or had no records of the individual. Authorities frequently found that the details in the submitted documents did not match actual government records.
Furthermore, officials noted that some individuals fraudulently claimed residence in districts where they did not live, with a few even residing in other states. Tehsildars across various regions had lodged written complaints after detecting altered or tampered documents, including falsified school endorsements and certificates from institutions that either did not exist or had no records of the applicants.
The ongoing investigation has revealed that a sophisticated network was involved in the large-scale issuance of delayed birth and fake death certificates. It has been found that the names and other identifiers of the accused individuals were either not present in official records or had been altered.
