68-yr-old impersonates 89-yr-old at Delhi airport, held

A 68-year-old man disguised as an octogenarian was caught at the Delhi airport after he landed from Hong Kong with a fake passport, officials said Friday.

Gurdip Singh, a resident of Moga in Punjab, had used the fake passport and a fake name — Karnail Singh — to get the Permanent Residence ID of Hong Kong, they said.

The Thursday incident comes days after a 32-year-old man was arrested for impersonating an 81-year-old at the airport. He had coloured his hair and beard white and arrived in a wheelchair to board a flight to New York from the airport on Sunday.

However, Gurdip Singh arrived at the Indira Gandhi International Airport by flight no. SG-32, the immigration officer told the police. He produced a passport in the name of Karnail Singh.

During the clearance process, the officer noticed the date of birth on the passport was October 20, 1930, but the man looked younger, police said.

After a detailed probe, the man's real identity was revealed as Gurdip Singh and his real date of birth as March 16, 1951, they said, suggesting he tried to age 20 years to hide.

A case was registered against Singh for cheating the Indian Immigration Department and travelling on a fake passport, said Deputy Commissioner of Police (Airport) Sanjay Bhatia.

Bhatia said Gurdip Singh departed for Hong Kong on August 2, 2018, on the basis of Hong Kong Permanent Residence Card and the Indian passport issued in the name of Karnail Singh.

He made his first India-Hong Kong trip on his own passport in 1995 and then visited there regularly. But he couldn't succeed to obtain a permanent ID of Hong Kong, the DCP said.

In 2006, he contacted an agent who arranged a fake passport in the name of Karnail Singh, which had his photograph. Since 2008, he has been visiting Hong Kong on the said passport and also succeeded in obtaining the Permanent ID of Hong Kong, police said.