Five men have been arrested for allegedly running a job racket that would dupe aspirants with promises of placement in the aviation industry against payment.

A team of officers from Eco Park police station in New Town raided two different offices housed in different buildings near the Akankha intersection in Action Area III on Tuesday afternoon.

The raids were conducted based on a tip-off, an officer of Bidhannagar Commissionerate said.

According to the officer, the arrested men were part of a racket that would scan job websites and connect with job seekers.

These men would then call them to their office — Apex Institution and Skill Care and Social Welfare. They claimed to be a training institute that could place them in top aviation companies, the officer added.

“They would then ask the job aspirants to pay various fees such as training charges, and medical examination
fees. They used to take anything between ₹30,000 and 50,000 from each job aspirant,” Manav Singla, the deputy commissioner, New Town of Bidhannagar Commissionerate said.

According to Singla, they have found records of at least 300 job aspirants who had enrolled in the “training programme and paid money”.

The racket had been active for the past three months, an officer of Bidhannagar Commissionerate said.

“We are trying to track down the other members of this racket,” Singla said.

Uniform fraud

Two men have been arrested for allegedly duping several businessmen from Delhi, Gurgaon, Assam and Gujarat for allegedly taking money from them in return for contracts to supply school uniforms and peripherals to government schools across the state.

A senior officer of Bidhannagar Commissionerate said they had received multiple complaints from the panchayat and rural development department, stating that fraudsters were using the name and logo of the
department that runs the Anandadhara scheme to dupe people.

A senior official of the department said under the Anandadhara scheme they have a project where school uniforms and bags manufactured by self-help groups are first procured. Then they are distributed among children in government schools.

“In the entire process, only items produced by self-help groups are procured and then distributed. These men, however, used to approach businessmen and promise to land them government contracts under this scheme,” the official said.

Badana Varun Chandrasekhar, the joint commissioner, headquarters of Bidhannagar Commissionerate, said
they have come across agreements that promised at least two businessmen contracts worth ₹15 crore and ₹53 crore respectively.

According to him, a warehouse in Dankuni was also raided from where the police seized 97,000 schoolbags, 3.85 lakh readymade school uniforms and a huge quantity of socks.

“These men would hand out agreements and ask the businessmen to start a supply chain. They would then hoard the items in the warehouse,” Chandrasekhar said.

The cops had last year arrested around 10 persons in connection with a similar case.

An investigating officer said those who have been arrested are part of a bigger racket.