Bengaluru: A 31-year-old man allegedly obtained a passport using a fake rental agreement and concealed pending criminal cases before fleeing to Saudi Arabia . He had submitted an application claiming to be a resident of Bengaluru and even cleared police verification.
Saleem had applied for his passport renewal , and the station received the verification request from the passport office on Jan 16, 2025. Instead, details of a 60-year-old man from Maharashtra were displayed. However, on Aug 4, 2025, a Subsidiary Multi-Agency Centre (SMAC) Intelligence Bureau input revealed that Saleem was facing heinous criminal cases in Tamil Nadu and that the cases were under trial.
Who handles passport verification at Byappanahalli police station, the accused, Ahamed Saleem, was a resident of Pudupattinam in Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu, according to the complaint filed by police constable Bharamanna Pujari. Before he visited the address, the very next day, Saleem appeared at the station and provided all documents required, Pujari said. The house owner reportedly told him that no person by that name had ever lived there.
The police inspector assigned Pujari for verification. His antecedents were checked in the police database, but no matching record was found. Given the data mismatch, Pujari continued verification. He learnt that Saleem had obtained a passport bearing No. Saleem submitted photocopies of his old passport, PAN card, driving licence and rental agreement. The application was subsequently forwarded to the police commissioner’s office and then to the passport office after verification. A set of documents was stored at the police station. IB inputs prompted Pujari to visit the address mentioned in Saleem’s application.