Varanasi: An overseas citizen of India (OCI) card holder, Mohammad Kuddus (78), who had obtained the Malaysian citizenship as Mohammad Kuddus Bin Razzag Shah, not only completed all basic formalities to ensure his name remained in the voter list during the SIR process of the election commission of India, but he also availed of benefits of several govt schemes.“Following detection of cheating and fraud committed by Kuddus, a native of Surai village under Nizamabad police station, police arrested and sent him to jail after producing him before the court,” said Azamgarh SP Anil Kumar on Wednesday.Police recovered his Aadhaar, Malaysian passports, OCI card and two mobile phones. Kuddus not only changed his name to Mohammad Kuddus Bin Razzag Shah, he also changed name of his father from Ali Raza to Razzag Shah to get Malaysian citizenship in 2016, said ASP Vivek Tripathi, adding, Kuddus used many fake documents for obtaining Malaysian citizenship while remaining a voter in India. Kuddus had left his village for Malaysia with his father in the 70s. They started a restaurant business and settled there, although their family remained in their village in Azamgarh. In 2016, he obtained Malaysian citizenship. Right from the onset of the SIR process, Kuddus started furnishing prescribed forms and documents through his son and later returned from Malaysia to stay in his parental village, said officials, adding that in Feb he gave an affidavit to confirm his Indian citizenship despite holding an OCI card.When his fraudulent acts were detected, police started investigating the case and it also came to light that he had availed benefit of govt schemes like PM Kisan Samman Nidhi by concealing his citizenship status. Following the developments, Nizamabad police filed a case on charges of cheating and forgery. The role of his son is also being investigated.Azamgarh hub of dubious passports Records of past just six months show how Azamgarh district has emerged as a hub of people using forged documents to obtain passports. Azamgarh SP office’s record shows that in past six months, 12 cases of seeking or obtaining passports with the help of forged documents were registered at Raunapar, Rani ki Sarai, Gambhirpur, Nizamabad, Ahraula, Saraimir, Phulpur, Didarganj and Maharajganj police stations. Five accused, including Abdullah, Mohammad Abushad, Rizwan Ahmad, Pramod Kumar Gaur and Jitendar, were arrested while seven other are absconding. The accused prepared forged documents and altered name, address and other identity-related details to illegally obtain passports.
