Punjab father-son duo booked for cheating youths

SANGRUR - A father-son duo who duped two youths of Rs.17.2 lakh on the pretext of sending them to Canada, have been slapped with cases, Punjab police said here Monday.

Cases of cheating, forgery and breach of trust were registered against Harbhajan Singh and his son Lakhvir Singh alias Lakha, residents of Amargarh town in this Punjab district. Both of them were on the run, police said.

“Harbhajan and his son are partners in a Jalandhar-based travel agency. They were associated with the company using fake names. A few months ago, they put out advertisements in newspapers inviting applications from truck drivers who were interested to settle down in Canada,” Gurdeep Singh, investigation officer of the case, told IANS.

“Supreet Singh and Amarjit Singh applied after the advertisements. They paid Rs.17.2 lakh to Harbhajan, who provided them visas. But on arriving at the Canadian embassy in New Delhi, they came to know that the visas were fake,” the police officer said.

Supreet and Amarjit, residents of Manvi village in Sangrur district, had earlier worked as truck drivers in Dubai for six years.

“We suspect that the father-son duo had also deceived many youths of this area by making false promises of sending them abroad. However, our investigation is on and we will arrest them very soon,” said Singh.

Police sources said that Harbhajan, a former manager of Food Corporation of India (FCI), was suspended after his name came up in a corruption case.

Sangrur town is around 100 km from the state capital Chandigarh.