Woman held in surety racket

She forged documents with two different identities to help criminals

A 30-year-old woman has been arrested for involvement in a fake surety racket and for being member of a notorious gang being operated from Tihar Jail, police said on Sunday.

Accused Nirmala Devi, a member of ‘MunnaJamanti Gang’ and a resident of Shastri Nagar, was arrested over a tip-off that she had been assisting hardcore criminals by appearing as fake surety with forged documents by different names like “Kanta” and “Salma”
in various courts of Delhi.

She was also wanted in several such cases of fake surety registered in Delhi.

“The action was taken after it was noticed that some organised fake surety rackets are operating in various courts of Delhi who provide fake surety to hardcore criminals so they do not need to appear in the courts during the trial of their criminal cases,” said deputy commissioner of police (south), Chhaya Sharma.

Some of such cases were reported from Tis Hazari, Saket and Rohini courts. The police was also assigned the job to arrest those criminals who are wanted and moving freely despite court orders so that they could be dealt as per law.

They then visited various courts and developed intelligence regarding persons who could be involved in such rackets and deployed sources for their apprehension.

“The hard work bore results and on Friday, specific information was received that Nirmala Devi was an active member of the racket,” Sharma added. On the basis of this information, she was nabbed when she was striking a deal with a new client outside the Saket court complex.

During her search, fake documents in the names of “Kanta’ and “Salma”, some letters or instructions regarding functioning of fake surety racket written by Manoj --lodged in Tihar Jail-- were also recovered from her possession.

Later she confessed that she was an active member of ‘MunnaJamanti Gang’ and had appeared in the past as fake surety with forged documents in various courts at Tis
Hazari, Karkardooma and Saket courts.

During interrogation, she told police that she started working as ‘Munshi’ of a leading advocate at Tis Hazari Court where she came in contact with another ‘Munshi’ Manoj.
“Manoj was involved in this racket along with Ram Avtar, Pawan Bengali, Manmeet Singh and some ill-reputed advocates. She also joined this gang and two fake identities -- ‘Kanta’ and ‘Salma’ were created for her,” Sharma said.

A case has been registered against her at Saket police station under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).