The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Man held for cheating jobless persons

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, May 09, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Man held for cheating jobless persons

By Our Staff Reporter

TIRUPATI, MAY 8. A man, who had allegedly been cheating unemployed persons for long by promising to get them plum jobs in the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) administration, was caught by people and handed over to the police on Saturday. Before being handed over to the police he was paraded before the media.

A number of fake identity cards, appointment orders and letterheads of even the TTD chairman, D.K.Audikesavulu, were recovered from him. Srirama Sudhakar, aged about 25, who made incoherent claims to the media, introduced himself as S.Venkataramana to some and said that his native place was Chittoor (Tirupati to some). He also claimed to be the close relative of the former TDP town president, Kasaram Bhaskar.

Speaking to mediapersons, Sudhakar said that he had taken up the `business' on the suggestion of one Vasu, working as a server in the TTD's Annadanam canteen. The modus operandi was to initially collect Rs.500 from unemployed persons as `application fee' and Rs.10,000 after getting the `appointment order.' In addition, he even created fake work experience certificates of the Hyderabad-based CARE Hospital that would be appended to the application form, if the job demanded prior experience. If the situation got tough with the applicants going on a threatening mode, Sudhakar would give a fake appointment order signed by none other than the `TTD chairman' on his `letterhead', not before collecting Rs.10,000. It would then be the newly-appointed person's headache to find his post and the seat at the office.

A merchant, Venkatramana, who was duped in a similar fashion when he sought a job for his son, asked him to come to his shop on Tilak Road, where he was caught on Saturday. Interestingly, instead of going to the police, the victim presented the accused before the media. Later, he was handed over to the police who are investigating the case.

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Andhra Pradesh