UNI

Bangalore, Apr 4: Police have unearthed a fake education certificate racket, involving a person from Uttar Pradesh, who allegedly issued certificates to people having links with the outlawed LeT in the name of a fictitious University.

The city police were interrogating Vijay Govind Prasad Agarwal of Uttar Pradesh and have confiscated registers, fake stamp seals and incriminating documents from him.

City Police Commissioner N Achyuta Rao said Mumbai police had recently arrested one Sheikh Mujamil alias Ataur Rehman Sheikh (22), having links with LeT in connection with the 2006 Mumbai train serial blasts. He had revealed that he had procured fake certificates from a branch of Bharatiya Shikshana Parishad, for which Agarwal was the Director. Using the fake certificate, he had joined a multinational IT company in the city. Ataur's brother, Rahil Sheikh had also got a job in a London-based IT major using such certificates and was now at large. The fake university allegedly had 52 branch offices all over the country.

Based on the information provided by Mumbai police, the city police took into custody Ataur from Mumbai police and Agarwal from the Uttar Pradesh police and continued investigations.

The Hyderabad police have also arrested two persons who helped the two brothers obtain fake certificates in that city.

Interestingly, Agarwal, a school dropout, also held a fake doctoral degree and even contested against former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in the 1999 elections.