Iranian couple arrested with fake passports

Immigration officials at Kempegowda International Airport have arrested a couple from Iran for allegedly trying to fly to Malaga City in Spain using fake passports. The couple — Golboustani Vahid, 38, and Erfaneh S., 27 — hail from the Azerbaijan region of Iran.

They claimed to have bought the fake Spanish passports from a tout in Bangkok, Thailand for $3,000. They claimed that they wanted to go to Spain for medical treatment.

The staff of an airline alerted D.K. Singh from the Bureau of Immigration (BOI) after they found the couple’s behaviour suspicious.

Mr. Singh questioned the couple and confiscated their fake passports before lodging a complaint with the police who registered an FIR under Section 14(a)(b) of the Foreigners Act 1946 and various sections of the IPC.

The names in the fake passports were Andres Ramos Pasha and Maria Gomez Demirci.

Inquires revealed that the couple had visited India on a tourist visa and went to Bangkok on a holiday. In Bangkok, they allegedly met a man who provided them with the fake passports and other documents. The couple flew to Mumbai using their original passports. They headed to Bodh Gaya in Bihar on March 19. On April 4, they were flying from Gaya to Malaga via Bengaluru on their Spanish passports when British Airways staff alerted immigration officials at KIA.

The person who sold them the passports in Bangkok has also been named in the FIR.

The couple told the police that they are married. “They claimed to suffer from a spinal cord disease. They were travelling to Malaga as treatment is cheaper there,” said an officer.