AHMEDABAD: Human smugglers have not only been forging identity documents, but also compromised the International English Language Testing System (IELTS). It is now known that the IELTS paper robbery in Mehsana in February was executed by human smugglers from Gujarat and Punjab.
“During the investigation, we found the involvement of one person who used different names such as Munnabbhai, Baka Bhai, Charles, Joseph, Moldy, Jack, Prince, Anthony and so on. Technical surveillance and human intelligence suggests that there was one person who promised to provide IELTS papers before the exam so examinees who wanted to go to the US could succeed,” said a police officer privy to the development.
The officer said the man was working for a Punjab-based agent named Ravneet Singh, an accomplice of notorious human smugglers Charanjit Singh and Guramrit Singh alias Pablo Singh. The person from Gujarat using the aliases is an aide of Bharat alias Bobby Patel, who was involved in the human smuggling cases related to the family from Dingucha and the recent one where six persons from Gujarat nearly drowned in a river on the US-Canada border.
On February 10, four unidentified men got out of an SUV at a courier company office in Mehsana and picked up only three blue bags containing IELTS papers. A man from Ahmedabad who supported the robbery was later arrested by Mehsana police.
Sources in the police said the people involved in the IELTS paper robbery were involved in human smuggling since 2018 and have sent thousands from North Gujarat, mainly Mehsana and Gandhinagar districts, to the US via Mexico or Canada.
Jagdish Patel, 39; his wife, Vaishali, 37; and their children Vihangi, 11; and Dharmik, 3, residents of Dingucha village in Gandhinagar district froze to death near the US-Canada border on January 16. The case was reported on January 19 after agencies from the US, Canada, and India began an investigation into the wider network of people smugglers.
On April 28, a similar tragedy was averted when six men from Gujarat — Amit Patel (22), Dhruv Patel (22), Neel Patel (19), Urvesh Patel (20), Saavan Patel (19) and Darshan Patel (21) — almost drowned in the St Regis river on the Canada-US border. A US customs and border protection agency team rescued them.

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